Dedication
by Elivra26
Summary: To dedicate one's life is one of the first things a soldier learns. But what does this dedication mean to some of the Survey Corps' members? Started as a one-shot but is currently a multi-chaptered fic, with each chapter dealing with a different character. Rated M for a particularly graphic chapter. Please review, thanks!
1. Devotion

**Howdy y'all! I now have one more fandom to obsess over, and one with so little material, in fact, that fanfiction is pretty much essential for me to deal with all my feels. So here's an idea that's been knocking about in my head for exactly nine hours. Hope you enjoy it!**

 **Disclaimer: AoT/SnK not mine. _Shinzou wo sasageyo_ , though!**

* * *

 _ **Devotion**_

"Watch out!"

She didn't know who had shouted and didn't bother finding out. She gasped and performed an unthinking backward flip, shooting out a wire from her gear in the next second. She swore softly as she landed on a tree.

She had been distracted and nearly paid for it with her life.

"Stop being careless," she chided herself as she leaped onto the approaching Titan's arm. Before another second had passed, she'd swung twice -the arm to the shoulder, and then to the other shoulder as she drew her blades neatly across the nape of the Titan's neck.

She rode the Titan's head as it fell, noticing that one of the men was staring at her in awe. She managed to keep a cool face as she jumped onto the ground. This wasn't her first party, still, solo kills were exhilarating every time she managed one. But she had to keep her emotions in check.

Case in point, she looked around to see how the rest of the Survey Corps was doing, but of course, her gaze immediately gravitated to _him_. He had been the reason for her distraction and she had nearly died.

"Rein it in, silly girl," she muttered under her breath. She forced herself to look away from him; he was riding away, and in any case, they were in the midst of a skirmish.

She surveyed the scene quickly, efficiently, evaluating squads to see where she could help. Her patch of land was free of living Titans and other members of her squad had already joined the main force.

She saw Hange just about missing the snap of a bald Titan's jaws. The squad leader was all alone, and was, as always, chattering away happily to the ravenous Titan.

With an internal sigh, she started to run toward the eccentric duelling pair, when there was a flash of steel, and blood was gushing down the Titan's neck.

Moblit was swinging from the dead Titan's chest, yelling at his boss, who was yelling back at him for interrupting their conversation. She felt a momentary flash of surprise -Moblit played the part of harassed dogsbody so well it was easy to underestimate him. But she had heard that Moblit was a formidable soldier and had joined the Survey Corps despite being in the top five of his training batch, just like her. Hange always picked the best of the best.

There was little left to do after that. The red smoke from the flares hadn't even dissipated completely but the Titans were all but eradicated. She helped Oruo, the creep, with one final kill, and they were done.

She quickly walked away and whistled for her horse, in no mood for talking. Her near brush with death had left her subdued.

She had always prided herself on her skills. Ever since she was a little girl, people had first remarked on her beauty. Not that she cared if she was pretty or not. She had always wanted to transcend the "cute" epithet people seemed determined to place on her. Sometimes she didn't mind, because she remembered her mother very little but knew she had been a rare beauty. In that sense, she could pretend they were complimenting her likeness to her mother. Almost no one actually did though, since no one seemed to have known her mother, and she was always left with a dull, hollow twinge in her gut.

But her skills were something she worked hard on, and cared about. Like the comments on her prettiness, a compliment of her skills was a compliment to her father -if he had ever signed up to the military, she knew he'd have been an excellent soldier. But he hadn't, and it was up to her to carry both her parents' legacy, beautiful and deadly in equal measures.

In the end, what was important was that she wasn't just another pretty face. She was determined to make her small world understand that.

And that hadn't changed with her newfound devotion. She wanted _him_ to notice her (such a cliché!), not for her pretty face, but for her fighting aptitude. And here she was, daydreaming like a moonstruck fool and nearly getting herself killed. The shame of it all!

The corps rode along without incident for the rest of the day. She remained alone with her thoughts, taking advantage of her position in the Scouting Formation.

They set up camp when the clouds above had turned an astonishing shade of pink. It had set everything aglow in a rosy hue, so that even the ugliest toad looked adorable in the light.

After freshening up, she brushed her horse's mane and tail and fed it some sugared oats she had managed to sneak in her pack. She was smiling at the animal's mute delight, when someone tapped her on her shoulder.

She turned around to see Keiji, from Hange's squad.

He had on his usual deadpan expression. "The Commander wants to see you." He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. Hiding her nervousness at this unexpected summons, she nodded and hurried across the camp.

Commander Erwin Smith was known by all and sundry to be a cold, calculating, and unemotional man. And yet, she wondered if the weather and the view had got to him too, as he was sitting on a table outside his tent, his legs stretched out in front of him, his heels digging into the rosy-hued grass. This was the most leisurely pose she had ever seen him in.

She stopped in front of him and gave him the customary salute. Under her clenched fist, she could feel her heart beat faster. "Sir!"

The Commander was reading from a parchment. He raised his finger with his eyes still on the parchment, and so she waited.

He was finished in less than ten seconds.

"I'm sure you're wondering why I've asked for you. I won't waste either of our time with small talk." As abrupt as ever. "We have been watching you, and evaluating you. I'm happy to say that your performance has been excellent." She wanted to point out that he certainly didn't look very happy, but decided to take the praise without comment, rare as it was.

"I'm forming a new squad within the Survey Corps. We're going to call it the Special Operations Squad. But I think a more common name for it will be…" His eyes shifted to a point past her shoulder. She wanted to see what he was looking at, but years of training forbade her from looking away from her Commander.

"The Levi Squad, I hear," said a voice behind her, and she felt her breath catch in her chest. Levi, the man himself, strode up to the table and leaned on it, his eyes boring into her face.

"Yes," Erwin had one of his infrequent smiles on his face. "As you can imagine, Captain Levi here will be heading the team. Unlike the other squads, the members of which we keep shuffling every now and then, this is a permanent position. We would like you to be a part of this team."

"M-me?" She was surprised she still had a voice.

"Petra Rall," Levi said, examining his fingers, and she repressed a shudder at hearing her name. "You have been on two expeditions so far and you have… how many kills was it?"

"Twenty-three, sir."

"Twenty-three kills."

"But," Petra said, feeling obliged to add, "only four solo kills."

Levi looked at her again, and again she felt a shudder pass through her body. "At the end of my second expedition, I too had four solo kills. Don't underestimate yourself. I chose you for a reason."

He had chosen her. _He_ had chosen _her_. She felt like crying.

"We will be making the announcement at dinner tonight. I think you are already familiar with the other members chosen for this squad." Erwin looked down at his parchment. "Eld Gin, Gunther Schultz, and Oruo Bozad." _The creep made it_ , she thought giddily. "I think you'll work well together, and are all good enough to keep up with Captain Levi-"

Levi straightened and took a step forward, which made the Commander stop talking abruptly. "I hope you're happy with this decision?" Levi asked her. His voice was untempered by emotion and his face expressionless. Yet she felt her cheeks flush as she exclaimed, "Happy?! I… I'm honoured, Captain!"

"Good. I value your dedication to our cause." He nodded, then turned away, a clear dismissal. She looked to the Commander, who also nodded. Though she hated that this exchange had to end, she still felt giddy and felt new meaning infuse her salute.

"I dedicate my heart!" _And my life, all to you, Captain Levi._

* * *

Erwin watched Petra Rall's small frame flit through the camp. He liked her earnestness and her excellent work. Yet he had his doubts.

"Are you sure you want her?" He asked Levi, who was also watching her.

"Do you doubt my choice?" Levi asked, and Erwin could hear the thinly-veiled temper in his voice.

"I told you I would leave the choice to you. I trust you."

"Then what's the problem? You doubt her skills?"

"Far from it. She is easily the best in her squad. I doubt her… dedication."

Levi finally turned to him. "Well I think she's dedicated enough. What are you trying to say?"

"Certainly, she is dedicated." He paused, choosing his words carefully. Levi angered quickly. "Question is, what is she dedicated to? Or rather, to _whom_?"

Levi narrowed his eyes. "This is beneath you, Erwin."

"I want to avoid unnecessary complications in my squad."

" _My_ squad, _my_ people, _my_ choice. There will be no complications. You'll get your perfect team."

"I'm taking your word for it."

"Understood." Levi pushed away from the table and dusted his pants. "Now, keep your busybody nose out of my team."

Erwin nodded. He watched as Levi tutted and walked over to a team with a haphazardly-constructed tent.

Complicated indeed.

* * *

 **So this is clearly based on the anime, since Petra seems to be more dedicated to her career in the manga, rather than Levi himself. I got this idea since I was thinking about writing a fic from Mikasa's POV (I know, _so_ original), and then realised that I could use a lot of it for anime!Petra. **

**So, Petra is like seriously underrated. She has the highest officially-stated number of kills in the serious. That's right, 10 solo kills and 48 assisted kills, which is insanely amazing. It's assumed, obviously, that Levi, and maybe Mike and Erwin have higher kills to their credit, but no one's ever mentioned the count. So sweet, kind, cute Petra, is the reigning Queen of kills. Which is why the beginning of this story fits her as well as it would have fit Mikasa, according to me, at least.**

 **Also, it is canon that Petra and Oruo were in the same training batch. So "creep" is a term of endearment... maybe?**

 **Hope you liked it, please review if you did!**


	2. Strength of a Thousand Men

**Okay, so, heh, did not expect this to be a chaptered fic. I totally got Petra's story idea in my head and I jotted it down. But then I kept thinking of other characters and what _they_** **were dedicated to. So, here we go. Another person, another conversation. Hope you like it!**

* * *

 _ **Strength** **of a Thousand Men**_

They told him, with much nervousness, that they would need some time to prepare his room. He did not mind waiting, and told them so, but that did not seem to assuage them. He had surprised everyone by recovering faster than expected, so the room that was usually reserved for him was given to someone else. He tried telling them not to bother evicting a person who probably needed the room more but no one was listening. It was a novel experience for him, since he had been a commanding presence for years now. He did not like it. Where was Levi when you needed him?

The doors of the common ward burst open and a young girl was wheeled in. This was probably the person they were moving for him. Then he started; he had recognised her. It was the girl with the strength of a thousand men -Mikasa Ackerman.

He watched them without seeming to from his end of the ward as they settled her on an empty cot with her back to him. The nurses -there were three -were slowly and carefully unwinding a long stream of bandage from the girl's torso. The bandages did not seem soiled or bloody, so he deduced her ribs were broken. For her part, Mikasa did not flinch or twitch in any way, and remained unnaturally still.

When they were done, they wrapped and buckled a thick, pliant, leather belt that covered her entire torso. It was a recent aid for injured ribs and reduced the time a patient had to stay in hospital and minimized the amount of bandage used.

When he saw the nurses were winding up their procedure, he made a sudden decision.

"Wheel me over," he said briskly to his attendant. The man complied immediately. He breathed a sigh of relief, _someone_ was listening to him, at any rate. The nurses balked and saluted hastily when he approached. "Commander!"

"At ease," Erwin nodded.

Mikasa turned around –far too quickly for someone in her condition. And yet she did not utter a murmur of pain. Her gaze was vacant, possibly the effect of the anesthetic, but then, the girl always had a stoic expression on her face.

"Commander," she said softly.

"I do not expect you to salute, soldier." He turned to the nurses. "Are you done here?"

"Y –yes!"

"Then you may leave." He gestured to his attendant, who understood and followed the nurses, but stayed in the other end of the ward. When no one was within hearing distance, Erwin turned back to the girl.

"I believe you were moved out of your room to make way for me. I hope that did not inconvenience you?"

"Of course not, Commander," said she, polite and cold as always. "I am being discharged anyway."

"Your ribs have healed, then?"

"More or less."

"Good."

Mikasa did not respond, nor did she make an effort to introduce some other subject. It was not rude, Erwin decided, there was a certain amount of deference in the silence that was due to his position as her commanding officer. He felt his respect for the girl rise.

"I have never had the chance to talk to you directly, Ackerman."

"We have," she said simply. "When we were discussing Annie Leonhart."

"True," Erwin conceded. "But I meant a discussion other than a mission briefing. I have spoken to Eren and Armin Arlert, but not with you."

"Oh." She looked at her hands in her lap. "Yes."

Not one for small talk, then. Excellent.

"Let me come to the point. I have some questions that I believe are pertinent to my role as your chief commanding officer. You do not have to answer them, but I would prefer it if you did."

"I will try my best to answer any and all questions the Commander puts forth."

Not one to commit rashly, either. His estimation of her rose higher.

"Good. Now, then. Can you tell me how you broke your ribs?"

She seemed a little surprised at the question. She turned her cool grey eyes to him as if to make sure he was serious, then explained clearly, succinctly, exactly what had happened.

"I see." He remained quiet for several moments.

"It was stupid," Mikasa said, breaking the silence. "I made a stupid move. I made many stupid moves on that day." Erwin simply watched her. "If I had been more careful, I could have helped more in the effort. Prevented many more lives from being lost."

He did not assuage her. "I'm glad you understand that."

Her eyes flashed, they seemed to say, _how stupid do you think I am_?

He smiled. "I truly am glad. You are important to mankind's survival, Mikasa, and I hope you won't make a similar mistake in the future."

Instead of a firm "Yes, sir!" that he was expecting, Mikasa Ackerman simply pursed her lips tight. Then she mumbled, "I can make no promises."

His surprise must've shown on his face because she burst into explanation, more animated than he had seen her. "Eren is a prime target of many dangerous people. He's a member of the Survey Corps. His life is in constant peril. I… I cannot promise to not act when Eren is in danger."

The change in her countenance was so drastic that Erwin had to reconstruct his argument. He had miscalculated –this girl was neither calm nor detached, she had a veritable storm of emotions brimming just under the surface. He understood now the bond between her and her two childhood friends, each of them burning in their own blaze of purpose.

"You are right." He said cautiously, "Eren is in constant danger. Even now, as we all recuperate and mourn our dead." That elicited a twitch in her hands, and he wondered if there was a specific life she regretted not being able to save. "For that very reason we must be smart –we have to be clever in our decisions so that we can save him, in the long run."

Mikasa remained silent. His words had clearly not reached her.

"You saw me in the battle," he told her, using his trump card. "You saw what I did. I cut him free from the enemy myself so you could catch him. I sacrificed countless lives and my own limb to make sure Eren was safe. You cannot doubt my intentions."

It took a moment for her to realize that she was expected to answer.

"I do not doubt it."

"Good," he said. "You have also dedicated, as I have, as everyone else in the Survey Corps has, your heart and your life to humanity."

"I have." Her voice was emotionless again but he could still see the fire in her eyes.

"Then do you understand what I ask of you, what I may ask of you in the future? If Eren is in danger, and it makes immediate sense to retreat, will you obey? Knowing that I will not rest until we have assured his safety once more?"

The pause that followed was the longest. Her face was hidden from him by her hair, and her hands clenched and unclenched themselves twice, thrice.

"I will."

"And if," he said carefully, "if Eren does die, will you continue to serve humanity to the best of your abilities?"

This time her hands remained curled into fists. "If Eren… dies, his cause will be my only one." She finally looked at him, and her eyes made the hairs on the back of his neck rise. "I have dedicated my life to protecting Eren, and through him, his reason to fight. They killed my family too. You have nothing to worry about, Commander. I will serve humanity until my dying breath."

His attendant called out from the far end of the room. "Sir? Your room is ready."

He motioned for the attendant to approach with his remaining hand. "Thank you, soldier."

Mikasa Ackerman bowed her head. "It is nothing."

He understood. It really meant nothing to her, this unusual dedication for Eren Jaegar. She really thought nothing of it. It was just a fact of her very existence, like breathing, perhaps.

They looked at each other for one long moment. Erwin felt as if he were looking in a mirror. It was unsettling.

The attendant reached them, his hands were soon clasping the handles of the wheelchair.

"Take me away," Erwin said abruptly.

* * *

 **Ye-eah I hope I'm not the only one who is creeped out by Mikasa's devotion to Eren. Be it platonic or romantic, there is a fine line between love and obsession, and I feel like Mikasa has crossed it a bunch of times. Anywho, I liked the idea of Erwin being creeped out by something, or rather someone, when it's usually _him_ that people are creeped out by. This is probably my fic with the least amount of italics, since they're both so un-dramatic!**

 **I hope the story was satisfying. Do review and let me know what you think!**


	3. A Sense of Duty

**Aand another! I'm clearly obsessed with this damn series, someone send help.** **Anywho, this is my shortest story yet, since the entire conversation is packed with intense dialogue. Also, there was no need for the the setting to be introduced, because...**

 **Anime-only pe** **eps beware, spoilers ahead! This scene takes place bang in the middle of Manga #59, so consider yourself warned. Enjoy!**

* * *

 _ **A Sense of Duty**_

It was their turn to clear up dinner, which was measly enough. They cleared up the cracker wrappers, collected and buried the animal bones and made a small pile of all the detritus that needed burning.

Jean stoked the flames that had burned low in the course of their conversation. Sasha and the Captain had guard duty, and Mikasa and Connie were tending to the horses before turning in for the night.

Armin felt hollow, despite the dinner. His ears were still ringing with the gunshot that had erupted from his gun, he could still smell the gunpowder and the blood as the woman had tumbled off the cart. Captain Levi's words at dinner, brutal as they were, had helped, but Armin suspected he would not get over this anytime soon.

"I never thanked you," Jean said suddenly, his eyes reflecting the glow of the embers. "Armin. You saved me when I was weak. Thank you."

Armin's hands trembled. "Please don't."

"No. The Captain was right. You saved my life and I should be grateful."

"That's why!" Armin said suddenly. "I don't want it. I don't want your gratitude to be an obligation."

Jean looked surprised. "But it isn't!"

"No? Aren't you grateful because you _should_ be? That I happened to save your life was just a side-effect of the act. The act itself was horrible, disgusting. Why would you be grateful for me committing it?"

Jean seemed to ponder for a moment. "You call it a side-effect," he said finally. "I call it an extenuating circumstance. You're right. It was a despicable act. What matters is not that you did it, but why. Your sense of duty made you commit that act and I cannot fault you for it." Jean paused, and turned away. "I owe you. This is the second time you saved my life."

Armin shook his head. "You saved mine when we fought Annie, outside the wall and in Stohess. It's probably best we don't count these things."

Jean didn't answer. His right hand was clenched into a fist. That reaction was so familiar Armin felt a question pop up, one that had been nagging him for weeks.

"Jean," he said slowly, "can I ask you something?"

A grunt was his only response and Armin took it as permission to proceed.

"Why… why did you join the Survey Corps?"

Jean did not look away from the flames. "I thought I told you."

Armin scratched his head sheepishly. "You didn't, actually."

Jean still refused to look at him. "No. I suppose not."

There was silence for some time after that as the flames were high enough and they set about burning the waste. Armin had already resigned himself to not getting an answer, when Jean spoke up.

"It's not Marco. I know everyone thinks I signed up for Marco but it's not true." Jean's face was so grim Armin felt himself turn cold. He had never seen Jean like this.

"I mean, he was a factor, you know. To think he died so -pointlessly…" He stopped, took a deep breath, and continued, "I didn't want that. For me. My life, more importantly, my death will not be pointless. It will _not_."

Anger burned in Jean's eyes. Or maybe it was just the fire. "I told you before, I'm no idealist like Eren. I'm still realistic. I'm still cynical. And now I'm realistic enough to understand that even a 'cushy MP job in the inner walls' is an ideal. Safety and security are myths."

He stood up abruptly, the fire casting long shadows on his face. "Since I'm going to die wherever I am in this nonsensical world, why shouldn't I live and die with a purpose? That is my duty now -to try to bring meaning to my death. To bring meaning to _their_ deaths-"

His voice cracked and he broke off. Armin scrambled to his feet.

"Jean, I'm sorry! I didn't mean-"

"It's alright." Jean's voice was already smooth, in control. "You had a right to know, I think."

Armin chuckled nervously. "Me? What do you mean?"

Jean looked at him seriously. "You are more important than you realise. My life in your hands, Arlert. I figured, at the very least, you ought to know why you've ended up being responsible for me in the first place."

"You overestimate me."

"You underestimate yourself. Like I said, our lives in your hands. Why don't you just own up to it and take responsibility as your duty demands?"

Armin was stunned speechless. Jean kicked up an impressive amount of dirt to quell the fire. Then, without a backward glance, he strode into the dilapidated stable.

He only paused at the doorway. "I joined the Survey Corps because I knew it was my duty. Do you know yours?" He left without waiting for an answer.

For a moment, Armin felt familiar despair rise up within him. _Worthless. Weak. They all hate you._ Then Jean's angry face and angry voice drove away the wave of dark thoughts.

 _"You underestimate yourself. My life in your hands, Arlert."_

Jean was right. It was his duty to protect his friends and he would fulfill that duty or die trying.

With a final sniff and squared shoulders, Armin went inside, too. When he finally laid down on his sleeping bag, he slept better than he had in months.

* * *

 **So this was fun and quick to write! I love these guys' dynamic -they've gone from being just trainees together to actually trust and respect the other. I do want to write more of them, but hey, keeping in mind the restrictions of this fic (dedication), this will have to do for now.** **Please review and let me know how you like it!**


	4. A Twist of Fate

**Righty-o. This one actually took me some time because it felt rambl-y. But I've cleaned it up to the best of my abilities, and hopefully the final version passes muster!**

* * *

 _ **A Twist of Fate**_

When he woke up, he felt a strong sense of déjà vu. It wasn't the same room as before, since they were in a different district, but it was pretty similar to the previous one. And just like before, there was someone at his bedside, except they were sitting very… differently.

He blinked to focus on the person, and their face slowly swam into view.

"...Connie?"

Connie jumped and swung his legs off the bedside table, and then sighed, embarrassed. "Ah, you're up. How do you feel?"

Eren sat up. "Not too bad. A little stiff." Then he remembered his thought process just before recognising Connie. "How's Mikasa?"

"Healing quickly. She's sleeping it off now."

"Good." He looked around, and Connie anticipated his question. "Armin was with you for a while. He had to go get some minor burns checked out. He just left, actually. I'm sure he'll be back soon."

Eren nodded. "Jean? The Commander?"

"Everyone's okay, Eren." Connie looked concerned. "You should stop worrying."

"Wouldn't you, in my place?" Eren snapped. He regretted his outburst almost instantly, and felt worse when he saw Connie's expression.

"Sorry, Connie," he mumbled.

"No, you're right. I'd be worried too."

Eren simply looked at his hands in his lap.

Connie, to his surprise, continued, "But you're not just worried, are you?" The look on Eren's face made him smile. "Don't worry, I'm still an idiot. Armin said you might be feeling guilty, too."

Ah. That made sense. "It's annoying how Armin is right all the time."

Connie didn't take the bait to change the subject. "Well, as far as I'm concerned, you shouldn't feel guilty."

Eren chuckled, though he could not see what was funny. "Sure." Hannes-san's smiling face swam into view again and suddenly everything was blurry. "No need at all."

"But it wasn't your fault, Eren! You didn't ask for this did you? You didn't ask to be humanity's only hope. You're not a Titan by choice." Connie stood up and looked out the window. "None of us are."

Eren, who was in the process of pulling aside the sheets, froze. "What was that?" Internally he felt himself go numb with fear and disbelief. _Not again_ , he thought desperately. _Not Connie, too_.

Connie turned to look at him, and seemed confused by his reaction. Eren was simply trying hard not to sink into despair that yet another comrade, another _friend_ would be betraying him.

 _Fight him._

 _NOW._

Pushing aside his pain (how much more must he endure?), he quickly considered the various ways in which he could fight Connie. Transforming into a Titan inside a building, especially a hospital, would be a bad idea. Weapons? Maybe there was a bread-knife in the food tray! But what if he only injured Connie and that triggered his transformation-

"Eren?" Connie's voice, painfully normal, seemed to jar him. "What's wrong?"

Eren tried to keep his face neutral but he was sure he wasn't successful. Armin called it an 'evil glint in his eye'. He knew what it was, though. It was rage, pure and simple.

"What… what did you just say?"

Connie took an unconscious step back. "Eren…?"

There was a quick rap on the door, which burst open in the next second. Eren could see the vague silhouette of bespectacled Hange Zoë in the doorway.

"Hange-san!" Both the boys burst out in similar tones of relief.

Hange frowned at the palpable tension in the room. "What's happening here then?"

Connie seemed to be at a loss for words. Eren took advantage of his hesitation and said, with an effort at a grin, "Connie, why don't you tell her what you told me just now?"

"What did _I_ say?" Connie asked, equal parts surprised and defensive.

It was that tone, so typically Connie, a voice he was well familiar with after three years of being comrades -it was his voice that finally made him snap.

"You damned liar!" Eren could hold himself back no longer. He tumbled out of bed, his fists clenched, his teeth gnashing. "You told me you were a Titan!"

His words echoed in the following silence. Connie still looked incredulous, but when comprehension began to dawn on him, Hange, of all people, spoke.

"What part of 'confidential' did you not get, Connie?" She sighed.

Eren felt as if the world was crumbling away from beneath his feet. He sank onto the bed, unable to process it all. It was bad enough that Connie was the enemy, but now Hange - _Hange_ was complicit?

"Hange-san… I don't…"

"It's alright, Eren. That's not what Connie meant. Have a glass of water, you look terrible."

He was so completely in shock that he actually listened to her. He felt numb, he couldn't think straight. What was wrong with his world? Why? _Why?_

Hange seemed to understand his pain. She poured him a glass of cool water and sat on the bench next to him, her expression so kind he didn't recognise her.

"Connie didn't mean that he was a Titan. Not like you or Annie or Bertholdt or-"

"What kind of Titan did he mean then?" Tears had blurred his vision so much he could barely see his own hands. "What the _hell_ did you mean?"

"Eren, I didn't mean -I'm on your side! I'm not the enemy! I didn't mean…"

Connie's floundering only served to deepen his anguish. Hange sighed, then placed her hand gently on his clenched fist. "Connie helped me with an experiment, Eren. With his help, we have come close to solving the mystery of the Titans."

They explained it to him, slowly, making sure he had not misunderstood anything. Hange started talking, but pretty soon, Connie had taken over. He explained it all, his demolished but empty village, Reiner and Ymir's reactions, the only picture they had managed to salvage from the rubble of his home…

By the time Connie finished, tears were pouring down his cheeks. Eren still felt numb. The information, momentous as it was, was being rejected by his brain.

No. _No_. He thought of his mother and Hannes-san, he thought of the feral joy and bloodlust that had coursed through him when he saw the grinning Titan being devoured… Suddenly he saw each and every Titan he had ever killed. The bearded Titan inside whose belly he had first transformed. The blond that had eaten Thomas. The pair of Titans - _a couple_ -that he had knocked over near Trost's supply station. The sandy-haired one near Utgard Castle that had been his first kill…

He threw up the little he had eaten then. Connie and Hange made no comment. They helped him clean up, despite Eren's protests, and then Hange left, after reminding Connie that his debriefing with Commander Erwin Smith would take place that afternoon.

"I'm sorry," Eren said in the silence that ensued after Hange's departure.

"Don't be," Connie shook his head forcefully. "I shouldn't have said anything. Or maybe I should've said it in a better way. It was stupid. Story of my life, heh."

"It wasn't stupid. You were trying to help me. That doesn't make it stupid." Connie had nothing to say to that, so they both watched the window curtains flutter in the breeze.

"Will you be in trouble?" Eren asked him after sometime.

Connie shrugged. "I don't think so. I guess they'd have told you eventually."

Eren looked at his hands, pristine and scarless. _Of course_. He was humanity's last hope, of course they'd have told him.

"You know the funniest thing," Connie said suddenly. "It… this news, it's made things clearer for me." He was still gazing out the window, fighting to keep a neutral expression. "I always wondered, you know, why I joined the Survey Corps. You did too, didn't you?"

Eren didn't answer, but then, he didn't have to. "I don't know what I was thinking, back then in the Graduation ceremony… I just knew that it would be wrong to walk away. Just _wrong_."

"But now it makes sense. Maybe it was fate. It was my destiny to join the Survey Corps so that I could find my mother… and maybe save her."

Connie turned to him, his eyes still bright with recent tears, his mouth twisted into a sad grin. "Don't you think so?"

Destiny. Eren wondered if that was it, some immeasurable, incalculable force that had brought Reiner and Bertholdt and Annie so close to him, and had made an invaluable soldier of Mikasa. Some fickle power that had pushed Armin to the forefront of humanity's thinkers, some cruel twist that had pulled the grinning Titan to him (and Hannes) again. Long-established life stories and preordained massacres.

He nearly threw up again.

But before he could answer, the door opened and Armin walked in.

Destiny, it appeared, had stopped him from answering and crushing Connie's hopes.

It was probably for the best.

* * *

 **Soo, this chapter's a lot longer and has a lot more italics because it's the POV of Eren Jaegar, drama queen extraordinaire. Like, I could practically hear him go " _Nande_?" XD**

 **Still, I loved writing it. Hope you loved reading it, too. Please review if you did! :)**


	5. A Debt Repaid

**Ho-kay, this was the most fun chapter to write, so far! I loved writing from Ymir's POV, she's so blunt and crass it's amazing.** **Ehh** **, Manga spoilers ahead, I guess? There is discussion about a character who doesn't appear until the 90's issues of the manga, so yeah.** **Hope** **you guys like it!**

* * *

 _ **A Debt Repaid**_

"There. I'm done. Do you want to read it over, correct the grammar?"

He sighed. "Don't be flippant."

"Don't _you_ be patronising. I'll be however the fuck I want to be."

"You have that right," he conceded, and outstretched his hand. "Give it to me."

Ymir hesitated. She looked away and folded the sheets of paper carefully, making sure each fold was symmetrical and perfect.

Reiner's hand faltered, then he dropped it. "You want to add something else?"

She stood up abruptly and thrust the folded papers into his hand. "No. If I say anything more, I… I won't know where to stop."

Reiner placed the folded up letter carefully in a small metal box and put the box just as carefully in his coat pocket.

"And you swear," Ymir said, not looking at him, "you swear you'll give it to her?"

Reiner didn't look at her either. "I told you. I swear on my life." His calm voice seemed odd against the heartfelt words.

"Good. Then I can die peacefully."

There was an awkward pause. Then Ymir turned around, her usual deriding smirk on her face, looking just like she did when she was still a Cadet in the 104th Training Corps.

"So what's with your boy Porco? Why does he hate you so much?"

Reiner frowned. "What makes you think he hates me?"

"Are you kidding? I'm not stupid. I saw the way he was around you when the two of you came to see me in my cell."

Reiner looked away. "It's complicated."

Ymir raised an eyebrow. "Complicated like you and me, or complicated like you and Eren?"

Reiner's hand curled into a fist. "I would prefer it if you didn't talk about that little shit."

"Why? He was pretty much your protégé wasn't he? He certainly idolised you."

"Stop it, Ymir."

"You know what, I don't think I will." She sauntered over to the simple chair at the desk and settled herself in it as though she was lounging in a luxurious couch. "I'm dying in less than 24 hours, and I'm allowed my bit of fun."

"This isn't funny."

"No? Well, tough." Ymir crossed her palms behind her head and leaned back. "So what's the deal with you now? Still having problems with the soldier-warrior existential crisis?"

"Porco is Marcel's brother." Reiner spat out. "That's why he's inheriting your power. That's why he hates me."

Ymir didn't respond immediately. After several moments, she simply said, "I see."

Then she smirked. "So you were trying to spare my feelings before, is that it? What a softie you are at heart, Reiner."

Reiner sighed. Ymir, to the bitter end, insisted on being as annoying as she could. How on earth did Krista put up with her?

"Well, does that surprise you?" He played along. "I've promised to deliver this, after all." He tapped the pocket where the metal box rested.

"True." And then, typically for her, she suddenly became serious. "Why _did_ you agree to do that?"

Reiner shifted, uncomfortable. "You… Left her. To come with us. The least we could offer you is a proper goodbye."

"Huh." She snorted. "Softie."

Reiner simply shrugged.

"So," she stretched. "Where's your better half?"

"Huh?"

"Bertholdt, _duh_. He's avoiding me, isn't he? Why doesn't he want to see me anymore?"

"He's not-"

"24 hours, Reiner. The least you could do is not lie."

"I'm here, Ymir." Bertholdt stepped out from the shadows underneath an archway. Ymir didn't seem surprised.

"Lurking as usual, Bertholdt? I thought as much." Bertholdt didn't answer, only had his signature anxious look on his face.

"I hoped you'd come to say goodbye," Ymir said cheerfully. "Imagine if you didn't and I died."

"Yes," Bertholdt said. "I wouldn't be able to live with myself."

Ymir snorted. "Don't underestimate yourself. You've managed so far."

Bertholdt looked away. "Which is why I don't know how much more I can take."

"Hmm. Fair enough."

Another silence followed this. Then Ymir sighed. "By the goddess, you two certainly are cheery. You were a lot more entertaining in the walls, the two of you."

"I want to ask you something," Bertholdt said suddenly.

"Ooh, this sounds promising. Fire away."

"Why did you join the military?"

Reiner, in his corner, flinched involuntarily.

Ymir clearly wasn't expecting this. She crossed her arms over her chest and asked him, "Why do you want to know?"

Bertholdt shrugged. "One less mystery to solve."

"I see." Ymir was quiet for so long, Reiner stirred, trying to find something to say, when Ymir finally spoke. "I thought it was clear I've made a lot of my decisions for her."

"But you hadn't met her yet," Bertholdt pointed out. "You were safe in the walls. You would never have to go outside again. Why join the military when it made your life that much more dangerous?"

"You're not wrong." She sighed. "I think… it was because of the story I heard. This girl… This poor girl they were banishing for the circumstances of her birth…They mentioned who the Reiss family really was. She was the real Ymir, you see? The one everyone _should_ have been worshipping. I wanted to see what she was like."

Both Bertholdt and Reiner looked stunned. "That… that was it? That was your reason?"

Ymir grinned at their faces. "Oh is that not good enough for you two? Fine, I'll tell you. It was because I was fucking starving. It's bad enough to have to live in that wretched walled country with their food shortages, it was worse living on the streets over there. The military offered food and shelter. It didn't ask for much with respect to antecedents. So I signed up."

The looks on the boys' faces hadn't changed. If anything, they looked uncomfortable now. The silence stretched out, while each tried to figure out how to respond. But then-

" _Fine_. I'll tell you. It was so I could go out and be free once more. You know the feeling, right? To not be cooped up in those infernal walls again?"

Her smile widened at their uncomprehending faces. "But well, if I must be completely honest, I guess the thought of being able to transform into a Titan again when I was outside the walls, all that raw _power_ -"

"Ymir," Reiner finally spoke. "What the hell are you saying?"

She stood up abruptly, her chair screeching so loudly that both the boys winced. "What I'm saying is it could be all those reasons, or some of them, or none of them." She walked over to her cell door. "What I'm saying is, it's none of your fucking concern. My debts to you are paid, and I don't owe you anything."

She walked inside and slammed the door shut behind her. "Try not to kill her before she gets to read my letter. Now leave me the fuck alone. I'd like to die in peace."

Bertholdt looked like he'd been slapped. Reiner's face turned dark with anger and shame. "Fine." He strode away and Bertholdt followed, still with a hurt expression. "Fare thee well, Lady Ymir."

They were at the top of the stairs when she answered. "May the best soldiers win."

With that malediction hanging over their heads, they left her in her cell.

* * *

 **So, I totally started out hoping to word what I thought would be Ymir's driving force but then I realised that Ymir's greatest and sometimes annoying trait was her unpredictability. So this chapter is probably the only one that doesn't leave you with a definite reason for the character's dedication.**

 **Hope my little attempt at Ymir's POV paid off! Let me know what you think!**


	6. Sustenance

**Okay, I've changed my mind, this was even more fun to write than the others. This also takes places in the middle of manga chapter 59; in fact, it happens a little after the little scene in this story's Chapter 3 _'A Sense of Duty'._** **Hope** **you guys like it!**

* * *

 _ **Sustenance**_

Sasha, to put it mildly, was bored. True, they'd had more than enough excitement earlier that day. And if they'd been in dire straits before, there was no comparison to where they were now.

But now, sitting alone in the dark tree, silently counting the minutes tick by, Sasha could do with _something_ happening. A low hoot of an owl, maybe. Or the sly rustle of a fox moving through the bushes. Anything, really.

But the woods they were in were eerily quiet, and she barely saw nor heard any of the usual critters one would associate with a forest at nighttime. Apart from the occasional chirrup of a cricket or croak of a toad, the forest was dead silent.

This silence had unnerved her, and she still wasn't quite at ease, despite the fact that it would help her detect anyone approaching from a mile away. She shifted her weight from one leg to the other as silently as she could. Her gear made the slightest tinkling sound possible, but to her heightened senses, it was loud enough to make her wince.

She let out a slow, quiet sigh. Guard duty sucked sometimes.

A dozen minutes later, she heard a slight sound from the direction of the barn behind her. She shifted position again to see who it was. The person, whoever it was, was making an impressive effort at being quiet. They didn't even have a lantern, and the night was fairly dark. She just knew, as a lifelong huntress, that someone was approaching.

There were only two people in their group who had skills advanced enough to accomplish such stealth. She squinted, and in the dull glow of the crescent moon, she made out the figure of the person as they walked toward the woods confidently. The height and posture confirmed who it was for her. She gulped silently, but waited, curiously, to see if she'd be spotted.

She was.

"Anything?"

She shook her head, and shimmied down the tree nimbly. She straightened herself, and saluted instantly. "Captain."

"At ease, soldier," Captain Levi murmured, somehow managing to keep his sarcastic drawl in his hushed voice.

"Is there anything wrong, Sir?"

"Why should there be?"

Before she could answer, there was a small rustle and gentle crack of a twig or branch some distance away. Both of them stiffened immediately, hands jumping to their swords.

Sasha relaxed first. "An owl?" He asked her.

She shook her head. "A bat."

"Right. No feathers."

She simply nodded. It was bizarre, explaining her hunting skills to Captain Levi, of all people.

She squirmed a little uncomfortably. "Err Captain… your watch isn't for 3 hours more."

The Captain raised an eyebrow. "I know what time it is, brat."

This only made her squirm even more. "Then…"

Captain Levi didn't answer her implied question. "Let's head back up," he nodded at the tree. "This time, could you climb up a little slowly?"

Her fear must have shown on her face. "I'm not grading you," he said, raising an eyebrow. "I want to observe."

Then, because her face had always been too goddamn expressive, Captain Levi rolled his eyes and explained further, "I want to observe you because I want to learn how, Braus. It's never too late to learn a new skill. Go on, up you go."

Without wasting her breath on more embarrassing talk, she obeyed. Climbing trees was second nature to Sasha, so much so that even slowing down her normally unthinking moves caused her some amount of discomfort. If someone had asked Sasha to show them how to walk, her slow movements would have been just as awkward and self-conscious.

The Captain, for his part, was watching so intently that Sasha found it frighteningly distracting. She tried not to think about his piercing, judgy gaze on her back as she climbed up.

What normally took her 5 seconds took her 8 this time. She couldn't go any slower.

As soon as she reached her earlier perch, she leaned over to see what her boss would do. He rubbed his hands together for a split second, and launched himself on the tree.

He was insanely good, especially if he was doing this the first time. True, he wasn't as silent, nor as graceful as her, but her skills came from years and years of not just practice, but habit.

Her awe was obviously apparent on her face. He frowned at her. "Wipe that ridiculous look off your face, Braus."

But Sasha couldn't stay mum. "That was amazing! And it was your first time climbing a tree?"

He frowned at the compliment but answered her. "Never this high. And never this tree." He moved his weight lightly, trying to find a comfortable position. Before she could point out a viable spot, he found it himself. Nestling in the fork of two branches so that he faced her diagonally, Captain Levi leaned back as casually as he did on armchairs.

Sasha had never really had a filter on her mouth. She wasn't as bad as Jean, who spoke truths _on purpose_ to provoke people; she often spoke exactly what she thought or felt, before pausing to think, without any agenda.

This was one such moment.

"You have hunter blood in you," she told him, settling down herself.

He snorted. "You think?"

"Yes," she said seriously. "With your senses and your skills…"

"That would be the thief blood in me, I'm afraid."

Sasha froze. The Captain continued smoothly, as though opening up to Sasha was a daily occurrence. "So when I say tree… I _have_ climbed this high, and higher before. Just not on trees. And I've had to be quiet and aware of my surroundings because, well," he shrugged, "I value the little freedom I can obtain in this walled world."

Again, her expression spoke for her. "Sasha," the man deadpanned. "You're in my squad. You shouldn't be so shocked when I talk to you."

"Yes, but we're not just talking. We're… _talking_." His unimpressed glare was far more familiar territory for her.

"Well, believe it or not, I can _talk_."

She still couldn't shake off the feeling of just plain awe. Captain Levi clearly inferred this and sighed. "Would it be better if you _talked_ as well?"

Sasha's eyes widened. The only thing more unnatural than Captain Levi opening up to her, was _her_ opening up to _him_.

"No, I suppose not." He sighed again. Then he dug into his baggy trouser pockets and unearthed two shiny, red apples.

"Do you -I guess you do." Once again, her face spoke for her. She made a grab for one of them, but Captain Levi whipped them out of reach. She looked at him, confused, and felt herself go cold. That look on his face was _very_ familiar.

"Neatly and with patience, Braus." He flipped out a small blade that looked like a paring knife, but considering the way it sliced through the apple, she figured it was much, much sharper than a humble paring knife.

Patience was never really her thing, but when it was Captain Levi on top of a tree with a sharp-ass knife telling you to be patient, you damn well would be. He cut the apples into even-sized slices in quick, deft cuts. Then he finally offered them to Sasha, who grabbed them and gobbled them up with as much grace as she had, which was practically none.

Levi looked at her with distaste. "Did no one teach you to eat properly?"

Food, as usual, gave her courage to reply, "I'm not _messy_." It was true. She hadn't let a single crumb fall, there was no juice dribbling down her chin.

Captain Levi rolled his eyes. "Sure." They ate in silence for some time. After she was done, her fruit-fuelled courage carried her through. "Why didn't you sleep, Captain?"

"What are you saying?" He popped a slice into his mouth. "I'm done sleeping."

 _Done_?

"Then… how long do you usually sleep?"

He was scowling, but he answered her. "Three hours. Four if I'm tired."

"That's it?!"

He simply looked at her.

"Everyday?"

He still didn't say anything.

Sasha blew a low whistle that could be mistaken for the wind, if there were any. "Wow. No wonder you're so crabby."

"I'm _what_?"

Her brash and unfiltered tongue often made her obtuse and she sometimes didn't know when to stop. This, however, was one of the rare occasions when she knew exactly when and why she had overstepped the line.

"I'm s-sorry!" She gasped, louder than she intended. A loud rustle and squawk erupted from a tree several yards away.

Sasha clapped her hands to her mouth, while the Captain glared at her.

Several moments of tense silence. Then, Sasha whispered, " _That_ was an owl."

"Are you crazy, hunter girl?" If they hadn't been on watch, Sasha suspected his voice would have been thundering.

She knew she should stop. She knew she was being silly and naïve and immature, but she had to say it. "My friends call me Potato Girl."

The silence after that was agonising. Sasha wondered if saying anything more would be the last thing she'd ever say, when he finally spoke instead.

"Tell me, _Potato Girl_ ," Captain Levi said slowly, his face an expressionless mask, "why did you join the Survey Corps?"

The question took her by surprise. She didn't answer immediately, wondering if it was rhetorical. Then, seeing in the meagre light that the Captain was waiting for her response, she shrugged slowly, trying not to jostle her gear. "I… don't know."

A slight sound like a snort. "Really. You're putting your life on the line and you don't know why."

"I -I…" She turned away, hoping she hadn't turned red. "It's embarrassing."

He simply waited.

She took a deep breath. She couldn't ignore a direct command. "For food."

There was a low hoot, probably from the same owl that had screeched before. "Food," Captain Levi repeated blandly.

She burst into explanation. The Captain's impression of her was bad enough. She couldn't let this go without properly explaining her motives. "I'm always hungry. Always. The worse the food situation is, the more hungry I get. So I eat as much as I can, when I can. And after that I'm always thinking of the next meal. Where, and when, and what I'll get."

She sighed. "When I was younger we never had enough food. We _had_ to be good hunters, see, or we'd starve. It got worse when Wall Maria was breached by the Colossal-" Her voice broke. The name hung in the air, waiting to be said. She had to say it. There was no point hiding from it.

She took a deep breath. "When Bertholdt and R-Reiner breached Wall Maria... It got worse. The refugees made it worse. The food was already scarce…"

"They stole your food." The statement, calm in itself, somehow managed to be accusatory. This time there was no hiding it. Her face was flushed with shame. "I did think that, before. Then my father sent me to the Training Corps to learn better. And I did."

She looked away at the dark woods stretching out for miles beyond them. "The refugees didn't steal our food. The Titans did." She shrugged. "It was simple. If I never wanted to starve, I'd have to help get rid of the Titans. So I signed up."

Captain Levi spoke a full four seconds later. "Good. We'll bring down every single one of them. Every single fucking monster."

Sasha flinched at the slur. Then, slowly, placing her faith on the rare moment of bonding that they had, she murmured, "Captain Levi, are you alright?"

She could see his dark eyes flash at her.

"No."

That he answered her was in itself a miracle. Before she could question him further, he continued, "Go to bed, Braus. I'll take over from here."

"But I still have-"

"You've earned yourself a couple extra hours of sleep. Congratulations." It was clearly a dismissal. "Don't tell the others, I'm not gonna make a habit of this."

Still she faltered. Captain Levi's eyes narrowed. "Get going, brat."

Well, that was that. With a quick nod, she turned around and crawled down the tree deftly. Before she could leave, though, she heard the Captain whisper, "Braus." She looked up, saw something fly at her, and caught it in one hand instinctively. It was an apple.

"Don't make a mess."

"Yes, sir!"

As she jogged back to the barn, munching on her fruit, she wondered if it had been too dark for him to catch her wide, grateful smile. She rather thought not.

She had managed to spot his smirk, after all.

* * *

 **Ho-kay, I suspect Levi here may be a little OOC, but in my defense, the man has had tons to worry about on that day.**

 **1\. Erwin (the man he'd follow to hell) has been arrested, possibly being tortured to death at that very moment.**

 **2\. Levi's a fugitive again, after having had years of some sort of stable, law-abiding life.**

 **3\. A lot of his old friends are dead, or dying, or missing (where is Hange?)**

 **4\. And worst of all, a man (a serial killer!) he suspects is his father, who left him when he was a frickin child, has suddenly appeared in his life again _as his enemy._**

 **5\. He knows perfectly well what Kenny is capable of, he's seen the new weapons, and _this_ is what is coming after him and his renegade squad.**

 **6\. He killed people earlier that day, not Titans, literally ripped through them to preserve himself (like Kenny the _Ripper_ ).**

 **7\. Anything else? Oh, right - he also failed in his mission, and Eren and Historia are in the wind.**

 **Of course he isn't alright.**

 **He deserves some fluff, and I love Sasha to bits and we've never really seen them interact much, so I had to write this. Ideally, I'd have someone give poor Levi a hug because he certainly needs it, but I can't picture that without the hugger getting their ribs and/or kneecaps broken in the process. So yeah.**

 **Also, on a side note, you guys realise that without the comic relief, Sasha is pretty much Katniss Everdeen? Damn right. I should just call this chapter the Hunger Games and be done with it.**

 **Anyhow, I clearly love these people too much and I need to stop.**

 **Let me know what you guys think, whether either of them is too OOC or too little. Review, review, please and thank you! :)**


	7. In Pursuit of Perfection

**Okay, first of all, thank you all so very much for the amazing reviews, they totally made my day! I'm glad my little stories caught your interest, and keep reading and critiquing!**

 **Coming to the chapter... Guys, I did it. I wrote the worst thing I have ever written. I won't say more 'cos you'll read ahead anyway, but I have to say:**

 **TRIGGER WARNING: strong language, violence, child abuse, child sexual abuse**

 **Yeah. It's that bad. *shudders* More at the end of the chapter. Enjoy the long read!**

* * *

 ** _In Pursuit of Perfection_**

When she finally reached the door, her hands were perfectly still.

Control. Poise. _Perfection_.

She knocked smartly, and was immediately answered by a cheerful, loud "Come in!"

She opened the door and walked into the unexpectedly large office. There was clutter everywhere: books and pages and little brass instruments, blades and capes and the odd shotgun or two. The walls were haphazardly plastered with maps and illustrations. She was especially interested in several large posters depicting the (known) anatomy of Titans.

At the end of the room, in front of a surprisingly uncluttered desk, sat her new boss.

"Welcome." Hange Zoë said with her usual grin plastered on her face. "What do you think of my office?"

The question surprised her. "It's… nice."

"Hmm. You're very polite. We might have to work on that."

She stared at the Squad Leader.

Hange laughed. "Come, now, Nanaba, I was only joking. You'll have to get used to jokes, you know. Have a seat. You don't mind me calling you Nanaba, do you?"

"N-no." She took the proffered chair.

"Excellent. I'm sure we'll get along splendidly."

Nanaba only inclined her head slightly. She doubted it would be as easy as the Squad Leader proclaimed. Rumour had it Hange Zoë was eccentric to the point of madness. But then, rumour also had it that she was one of the three best soldiers in the Survey Corps.

Hange leaned back in her chair, her eyes still focused on Nanaba. "Now, this meeting is simply a formality. It's not even mandatory. But I think you're an exception, so I scheduled it anyway."

Nanaba stirred. "May I ask why I'm an… exception?"

"Because I have more than the usual questions. Some of which I can't address in a casual conversation over dinner."

There it was. She knew it was coming.

"I see you haven't provided a family name in your application." Hange shuffled some papers on her desk. "While you're not the first to do so, it is uncommon anyway. The only other person in the Survey Corps right now with no family name is a renegade from the Underground City in Sina."

"Does it matter?"

Hange did not seem fazed by her curt question. " Like I said. The only other person is a reformed criminal-"

Nanaba had heard of this man. "I'm no criminal. I graduated fair and square from the Training Corps."

"I'm aware. Top of your class, in fact." Hange's grin was almost feral. "I had to fight to get you in my squad. Erwin always ends up with the good ones."

She let herself frown. "I don't understand. If you doubt me, why did you want me in your squad so badly?"

"Oh, I don't doubt you, not really." Hange paused, as though she were considering how to best explain her motives. "I've heard rumours that you belong, in fact, to a very old noble family. The Hol-"

"Yes. I do," Nanaba said swiftly. There was no point denying it.

Hange raised her eyebrows. "Word is there are no heirs left in that family. Their bloodline will die."

Nanaba curled her fingers into unobtrusive fists. "That's true." Understanding flashed upon her at that moment. "Oh. You think… you think I'll quit the army. Go back to secure my bloodline's future."

Hange did not deny it. "Your records from the Training Corps are extremely promising. I'll be frank with you -I have plans for your career in the Survey Corps. You have potential to grow well, barring dying on the expeditions, of course." She said that last statement matter-of-factly. "But all that is based on your skills. You most certainly have the skills. Do you have the ambition?"

Nanaba looked at the carpeted floor.

" _I have plans for you."_

* * *

 _She was six years old, standing outside large, gloomy doors, her knees shaking. When she was finally given leave to enter, the doors opened with ominous bangs and creaks. Shivering, she entered the large, cold stone hall. At the far end of an obscenely large and ornate wooden table sat a man. He was clearly well-built, and had silver-blond hair, just like her, tied into a loose, silky ponytail. He was leaning back indolently, reading a parchment of some sort. He didn't look at her until she came to stand right in front of him._

" _Papa?"_

 _He rolled up the parchment and looked at her_. _She was suddenly reminded of people in the marketplace, evaluating and judging the best, ripest fruits to buy._

 _She waited patiently for him to speak. What would be his first words to her?_

" _Who are you?"_

 _Tears sprang in her eyes. "Pap-?"_

 _WHAM._

 _Before she even saw it coming, the rolled-up parchment was slammed into her head, wooden end first. Pain erupted in her skull, so sharp that she was stunned into silence._

" _Who are you?!" His voice thundered through the haze of pain. And then she remembered how anxiously her nanny had taught her basic etiquette, how she had insisted on drilling the proper social convention to greet a Lord of her father's standing. In the excitement of the moment, she had forgotten completely._

 _Knees shaking so hard she wobbled on the spot, she spread out her flowing skirt with her little hands and curtsied deep, her trembling knees nearly sweeping the floor and her head pounding as she bowed. "Your Grace," she stammered, her cheeks wet with tears. "I am your daughter, the Lady Nanaba."_

 _Her father flung the parchment away, reached down, and jerked her chin up, his fingers smooth and cold. "You need to do better," he spat and pushed her away so hard she nearly fell. But she was a fast learner, she knew falling gracelessly was an absolute no-no. "Unfortunately, your mother saw fit to give me you as my successor and I have no other choice. I have plans for you, daughter, and you'd better be perfectly ready for them."_

 _And because she was a fast learner, she knew what she had to say. "Yes, Your Grace."_

* * *

Nanaba frowned at the bespectacled woman in front of her. "You don't have to worry on that account. I'm not going back."

Hange tilted her head curiously. "Even if your father died?"

"I'm not going back." She repeated calmly. "As for your… plans. I'm not sure I'm the right person for them. I'm not very ambitious when it comes to power and position."

"Neither am I," Hange grinned, "yet, here I am, at the highest position possible in the Corps, next to Commander."

Nanaba stared at the woman. Hange's intellect seemed to run in layers and layers of wit and cunning. She felt her respect for the Squad Leader go up several notches.

"Well, technically Erwin's Second-in-Command, but he's a Squad Leader like me, you know. Anyhow. No power, no politics for you, huh."

"No. No politics."

* * *

 _She was nine years old._

" _See you tomorrow, Nanaba!" Ellen, her only friend in the world, waved at her and skipped over to where her butler waited with the carriage. Nanaba watched them go, then turned around and headed towards the river. As always, she garnered stares as she walked down the street. Her sleek white-blond hair fell in a shimmering curtain down her back, all the way to her waist. She was wearing a simple velvet frock -old and worn, but not obviously so. To outward appearances, she was still a rich noble._

 _When she reached home, she went straight upstairs to put away her books. She changed into a chintz day dress that hugged her girlish figure and ran downstairs for dance class. Miss Gregory was not a patient woman, and worse, she was a tattle-tale. She moved through the motions dully, her mind on her History and Politics class from earlier that day. There was a challenging assignment due the next day and she couldn't wait to take a crack at it._

" _Lady Nanaba!" Miss Gregory was shrill, annoyingly so. "Spin to your left, not your right-"_

 _After dance lessons came piano lessons. She had a beautiful voice, courtesy of her mother, and had a magnificent range in pitch, managing both low and high notes with ease. Her problem was the actual piano playing, which gave Miss Gregory much grief, since singing was only secondary and playing the piano was the main skill to attain._

 _She somehow managed to sit through piano lessons, then ran off in the direction of her room almost as soon as they were over. She ignored Miss Gregory's outraged shouts that she had not 'taken leave of polite society as etiquette demanded'. Who cares, she thought to herself savagely._

 _That night, she found out._

 _She was nodding off in the desk chair that was too large for a child, finally having finished the History report for school, when her door swung open and a tall, broad-shouldered man stood in the dark threshold._

 _Reflexively she tumbled out of the large chair and swept into a now-familiar curtsey. "Your Grace," she murmured._

 _The Duke strode in, his shiny leather boots making the wooden floorboards groan with his heavy, imperious tread. He didn't say a word and she didn't dare rise up from her bow._

" _What do I hear," he finally said, his smooth aristocratic voice echoing in her cavernous room, "about you slacking in your lessons?"_

 _Her head shot up. "I'm not! I -I swear, I'm doing all my homework, and studying as much as I can, Your Grace. I was doing a Politics assignment, look!"_

 _Her father glanced at the table where sheets of her precise writing resided. He took one sheet and began to read. She waited, sweat dropping down the back of her neck, knees still bent in a bow._

" _So you think," the Duke said after a long minute of silence, "that the Inocencio family lost its standing and its power because it was too greedy and corrupt?"_

" _It was what we were taught," she whispered._

" _Stand up, already. Stop grovelling." She rose to her feet as smoothly as she could, but her knees were knocking together again. "You were saying?"_

 _She was an Heiress of the Old Order. She must not mumble. She must not dither. She must speak in a clear, but pleasant tone, never shrill. She must be perfect._

" _Our history teacher taught us this."_

" _Your history teacher." The Duke fingered his belt, and she saw, with a thrill of terror, that it was not empty. "Tell me,_ _child_ _, what were the Inocencios to us?"_

 _She knew the answer. "Your Grace's grandmother's paternal aunt, the Lady Clara, married Ulric Inocencio in 769."_

" _What was that?"_

 _Her knees were knocking so hard they hurt now. "I -in…" Oh no. "In 759."_

" _And what does that make the Inocencios to you?"_

 _She searched wildly for an answer. "Family," she whispered, her voice no longer clear as a bell._

" _Yes. Family." Relief only lasted a couple seconds. He was clutching her report too hard, the papers were crumpling in his tight grasp. "And you think some lowlife history teacher bred in the filth would have a better notion of the Inocencios than their own family?"_

" _N -no."_

" _And do you think this streetside scum of a teacher deserves more of your time and efforts than Miss Gregory, who does not come cheap?"_

 _She bowed her head and willed herself not to cry. "No, Your Grace."_

" _Good. Do you know what you did wrong?"_

 _Her thudding heart sank to her stomach. "I do."_

 _The Duke unhooked something from his belt. "Then get the papers."_

 _She wanted to scream, to beg, to protest and plead, but she'd had years of practice by then. She knew it was no use. Mechanically, she pulled out a sheaf of old newspapers that she kept neatly stored under her adult-sized desk. It would not do to stain the expensive carpet, after all. She spread the newspapers out evenly just in front of her bedpost, so she could hold on to it. The dark wood had been permanently marred by the shape of her nails digging into it._

 _Then, willing herself not to shiver, because she must not, she stood on the newspaper mat, untied her nightrobe and turned around, baring her backside completely to her father. She leaned her forehead on the bedpost, her knees still shivering. She tried to tell herself that it would be better later as she could use the soiled papers for the fire. But of course, that was_ _later_

 _She heard the leather snick as it uncoiled. She closed her eyes and bit her lip._

 _Sometimes the Duke talked, sometimes he screamed. Other times he was dead silent, like now. There was nothing more to say. She had been wrong. She had to be punished, so she would know better next time._

 _The whip came slashing down onto her bare skin. She tried not to scream, but gave in after the eighth lash, a new record._

 _When he was gone, her voice hoarse from screeching from the pain, and she burned the bloodstained newspapers and her torn-up report in the fireplace, she told herself politics was something she would never bother herself with. Ever again._

* * *

"Well, you don't have to worry about it. The Survey Corps isn't very bureaucratic, you know. No time for it, ha-ha! Too busy trying not to get eaten, you see."

"I can imagine," Nanaba said drily.

Hange leaned forward. "Can I ask you something?"

She shrugged. "You said you had questions."

"Did you have any combat training other than in the Training Corps? It's not mere curiosity," Hange added hastily, realising perhaps that she sounded nosy, "I feel knowing your capabilities better would allow me to properly assign tasks to you."

Nanaba stared at her.

* * *

 _She was eleven years old._

 _She was crossing the school courtyard in the mid-afternoon heat, shading her face with her books._

 _She had nearly reached the lone willow tree where she usually lunched, when she heard it._

" _Dumpling! Dumpling!" She turned around, and noticed a group of three older boys huddled around a short, stout girl. She looked younger than her._

" _Hey fat fairy!" One of the boys screeched. "How are your button toes still holding you up, huh?"_

" _Are you heading to the swings, fatso? Haven't you broken enough?"_

" _Why don't you tell your rich Daddy to buy you a stone desk of your own? You've gone 'n bent all the wooden ones anyway!"_

 _She was next to them before she knew it. "Leave her alone, please." Always polite, always a lady. The girl looked at her with tear-filled doe eyes._

 _The boys turned around and seemed to recognise her. "Well, well, if it isn't Icebitch. Feels good, does it, to order people about? I hear you've got a broomstick up your ass from all the slave work you do in your draughty house."_

" _Did your Father buy you a fire yet? Or do you still burn your mother's silks to warm yourself?"_

 _More along the same lines. She curled her hands into fists. Poise. Perfection. She chanted in her head. Poise. Perfection. Poise._ _Perfection._

" _Please leave us alone."_

" _Or what, Lady Snow-slut?"_

 _She didn't know what to do. Out the corner of her eye, she saw Ellen hurry away, as she usually did these days. "We'll leave you alone. You can go do as… as boys do." Slowly, she reached behind her for the girl's hand. No sudden moves._

 _But it didn't work. One of the boys stepped forward. "Well, then, Icebitch, you know what boys do? Take down anyone that stands in their way."_

 _That actually made so little sense that she opened her mouth to propose a counter-argument. She never got to voice it._

 _The boy's fist connected with her jaw and she was on the ground in a dusty heap. Panic started ringing in her head._

 _Not the face, not the face, you_ _never_ _touch the face or people will see._

 _People will_ _see._

 _The boys had already shoved the girl down. Without thinking, she stumbled up and hurtled at them. "No!"_

 _Her momentum knocked over one boy and shoved the next hard enough for the girl to slip through his grasp and escape. The third boy jerked her away from his friends. "What do you think you're doing, you little slave? I'm gonna make you squeal like a pig, just you watch!"_

 _She tried to run, but he was too fast for her. He caught her flowing sleeves and yanked her back, sending her tumbling down onto the ground._

 _And then, they began to unleash their rage on her._

 _They rained punches all over her as she tried to cover her face with her elbows, but to no avail. Punch upon punch landed on her face, but she made no sound._

 _I will not cry. I will_ _not_ _cry._

 _But then one of the boys kicked her in the side: she let out a scream so loud and feral, everyone in the school grounds froze. The boys stared down at her in shock. "What the fuck-?"_

 _It was loud enough to alert some teachers in the school building, who came running to investigate. One look was enough, and the boys were hauled into the school, awaiting their parents for their punishment._

 _Meanwhile, the school physical activities teacher carried her gently to the infirmary, where he patched up her many wounds. She, however, was still in shock herself. Tears kept rolling unbidden down her bruised and swollen cheeks._

 _The face, the face, the face._

 _Presently, the teacher looked at her. "Now we know why you screamed. Your ribs are fractured."_

" _Oh."_

" _Oh? It must have hurt badly when your ribs broke."_

" _It did."_

" _Do you remember your ribs breaking?"_

 _Silence._

" _Did those boys break your ribs?"_

 _Pause. "I suppose."_

 _The teacher kept looking at her. "The bruises and swelling around the ribs are more than a day old. So are these marks on your back-"_

 _Nanaba hopped off the bed. "Please. I must go."_

 _The teacher stood up as well. "Who does this to you?"_

 _She tried to walk away, but the teacher caught her upper arm. And just like her scream, she couldn't stop the flinch that marred her face._

 _The man noticed and let go of her immediately. "You have a bruise there, too?"_

 _Nanaba rubbed on her arm ruefully. Because he kept looking at her inquiringly, she finally said, "Maybe."_

 _He stared at her, as though trying to gauge her. She let him watch her steadily._

" _You won't tell me who did all this and you won't let me tell your father."_

" _Those boys did all this."_

" _Even the month-old bruises?"_

 _She kept mum._

 _The man sighed, then wrote something on a slip of paper. "Get this salve from the apothecary, it minimises pain and reduces scarring. We don't want any blemishes on that pretty face, do we."_

 _Nanaba stared at him._

 _He shrugged. "Not that I care. But people seem to, so go, get that salve. It's not expensive." He paused. "What I do care about is how unprepared you are for your life."_

 _A spark of anger flashed within her. "I'm being groomed to be perfect for my life."_

" _I'm sure," the man drawled. "But I'm not talking about grooming. I'm talking about training."_

" _What-"_

" _Self-defence. Basic hand-to-hand combat. You think you can stay an extra hour at school everyday? I'll teach you."_

 _Nanaba could not believe her ears. "B-but…"_

" _It's either this or I tell the grownups. All of them."_

 _No. She could not have that happen. Resigned, she nodded. The normally expressionless man looked relieved. As to her, she felt as if a huge weight had been removed from her chest._

 _Self-defence. Fighting. She would make sure she was perfect at it._

* * *

"I learnt sparring at school," Nanaba told the squad leader. "A retired military man was our physical activities teacher."

"Excellent! That explains your performance in hand-to-hand combat. Exceptional scores."

"I had a good teacher."

"Evidently. Those skills may not be necessary for killing Titans, but they can be-"

"Useful," Nanaba cut in. "Yes, I know."

"Come in handy before, eh?"

Nanaba shrugged again. "Saved my life."

Hange stared at her.

* * *

 _She was twelve years old._

 _She was doing a geography assignment that involved lots of complicated drawings, something she was never very good at. She was so focused on her work that she only heard the heavy footsteps when they were outside her door. This was unexpected. He had not come to see her for months, not after the school-fight, after which she had made sure he had no cause to berate her._

 _She slipped out of her chair into an automatic curtsey, just as the door burst open and her father strode in._

" _Get up, already," he growled, and Nanaba straightened to her full height, which was quite tall now. She did not look like a child anymore._

 _The Duke had been looking more and more dishevelled over the past weeks. Tonight he looked smarter -he had shaved, and he was wearing his velvet suit. But his hair had escaped his untidy ponytail, and a strong smell of alcohol pervaded his environs. He was holding a heavy crystal bottle half-filled with amber liquid. She noticed it, and recognised it to be an expensive liquor that was manufactured in Wall Maria._

" _What do I hear," he began as he always did, but with a voice so slurred he sounded like a different man, "of the Earl of Darcy's son getting engaged?"_

 _She bit her lip. She should have known this was coming. "Yes, to the Duchess Oblonsky."_

" _That prick Lobov was right then," he snarled and staggered over to her chair and slumped into it._

 _Nanaba had nothing to say. She discreetly distanced herself from the desk and waited for the inevitable outburst._

" _The Duchess Oblonsi-kky," he drawled. "I was wondering why the name sounded familiar."_

 _She felt her heart begin to pound, her hands curl into fists. "She was the girl in the… incident at school. The one the boys were picking on."_

" _So you're telling me," he breathed, his eyes narrowing into dangerous slits, "that fat slut managed to land herself an Earl's heir while you little miss pretty are still not betrothed?"_

 _Calm. Poise._ _Perfection_

" _I have never met the Earl's son."_

" _And whose fault is that?!"_

 _She stayed silent._

 _The implication was obvious, and the Duke's face darkened with anger._

" _Insolent little bitch. Get the papers."_

 _She glanced at his waist belt. There was no coiled whip._

" _I said, get the damn papers!"_

 _She moved, let herself perform the next few actions from muscle memory. In her head she chanted, "A few more days, only a few days left…"_

 _The newspaper mat was ready, the robe slipped off. She turned to the bedpost and held onto it, eyes screwed shut in anticipation of the pain._

 _She waited for what seemed like an eternity, beginning to shiver in the cold. Then, unexpectedly, she felt a cool smooth hand on her behind._

 _Her heart stuttered, then skipped a beat, her stomach felt hollow and her throat was suddenly dry._

 _The hand caressed her, then slipped around her waist and held her firmly. The other hand followed in a similar movement, pausing only to squeeze her behind before encircling her waist._

 _This was new… And she did not like it._

 _Her heart was now racing so fast she was afraid it would burst. She felt waves of panic and fear rising in her, but she didn't know why._

 _The hands pulled her roughly until she was standing in front of her grand, full-length mirror. What she saw nearly made her whimper with fright but she could not understand why._

 _Her slim, white, form faced her, large white hands pressing down on her abdomen. Behind her lurked the tall, dark, ominous frame of her father, his eyes focused on the reflection of her naked body._

 _Her_ _father._

 _He moved his right hand up and cupped her newly-grown breast._

" _You look just like your mother," he whispered, his warm, drunken breath rolling over her neck. He stroked. "She was a fucking beauty." He squeezed. "The most beautiful debutante that season." His own untidy ponytail slipped onto her shoulder, mingling with her long locks._

 _It was the same hair._

" _She was so gorgeous there were men who cried when she was mine." Another squeeze. The other hand was now roving up and down her side. Firm. Insistent._

" _...Like a porcelain doll. God, I enjoyed breaking her in." The other hand found her other breast and now they were both kneading, pressing, stroking her._

 _Her breaths were coming in fast gasps. She was so shocked and so terrified that she had lost her voice. Her eyes were dry; no tears were forthcoming. She had just not been ready for this._

 _She had been groomed all her life but not for_ _this._

" _She was an annoying cunt, though," her father continued about her mother as he nuzzled her neck. "Had all these_ _ideas_ _. Even named you after some Oriental ancestor of hers." He rubbed her nipples until they hardened painfully, making the first tears prick in her eyes. "Now I have to keep disappointing prospective suitors when I say you're Oriental in name and nothing more. Stupid bitch."_

 _Her mouth finally managed to form a word, but no sound was forthcoming. "S-stop," she wheezed._

 _Her father seemed not to hear. "Fucking gorgeous," he murmured. One of his hands continued to grope her chest. The other slipped down, pressing into her belly button, thumb circling it for a good few seconds, before slipping further down._

 _Bells started to ring in her ears. A jolt of energy seemed to zip through her as her father's cold fingers went lower, and months of training suddenly kicked into action._

 _She grasped his wrist and twisted it, not letting go when she sprained it, ignored her father's cry of pain and twisted his arm and slipped under his grasp._

 _She didn't wait to cry or scream or beat him up, all of which she wanted to do. She ran._

 _Freedom, however, was fleeting. She had barely run a few steps when she felt a sharp pain in her head and she fell backwards on the floor, her father's fist tangled in her long, streaming hair._

" _Insolent little cunt!" He snarled, and dropped to his knees, crawling over her and pinning her arms down. She had begun to scream and flail, but he was strong, he was too strong; his knees were holding hers bunched together, his hands were pinning her arms down. She screamed harder, someone,_ _someone_ _had to come, someone had to stop this._

" _Shut up, will you," he grinned savagely. "I'm not gonna do anything. Wouldn't want to sell damaged goods to the suitor, eh?"_

 _Rage burned through her, her vision turned red and suddenly, she was very aware of everything in her vicinity. Including the sparkle of a crystal bottle in the corner of her vision. It was the liquor, which she had knocked over, but not broken, when she had tried to run._

 _Her left hand spasmed in an effort to grasp it, and succeeded in her first try. She curled her fingers tightly around the neck of the bottle and glared up at her father's mad, laughing dark eyes._

" _I am not yours to sell!" She spat at him and swung with all her might._

 _There was a flash of amber and crystal, then the bottle connected with her father's head and shattered into a thousand, deadly little pieces. He slumped and dropped sideways and with a terrific effort of strength she didn't know she had, she pushed him off her._

 _She could not leave the room too soon; in her hurry, she kneeled on a jagged edge of crystal that cut into her flesh. Ignoring the pain, ignoring the fury, ignoring the all-consuming urge to stab him with the broken bottle, she ran._

 _She ran straight to the garret, where she had hidden the boy's clothes under her mother's old dresses. She ran to the coal-cellar fireplace, where she had hidden the hunting knife her teacher had given her. She ran out of the house, out of the quarter, all the way to an inn where she dressed her wound again and cut off all her disgusting silvery hair. She ran and kept running for weeks, until the 98th Squad of the Training Corps began that year._

* * *

"Tell me, Nanaba," Hange said quietly. "Why did you join the Survey Corps? With your skills, and I think, your instinct for survival, you would not have chosen such a dangerous option."

Nanaba hesitated. "I have friends here. A lot of my squadmates have signed up to the Survey Corps this year."

* * *

 _She is sixteen. The Survey Corps is having a night out in town. She smiles at her friends, but doesn't feel compelled to join in the revelry._

 _Two other people sit at the table with her, amusingly enough, the tallest and shortest man in the Corps. Neither of them are saying much, and that suits Nanaba just fine._

 _Mike Zacharias, humanity's second best, gets redder with every drink he downs. Levi, humanity's best soldier, sips glass after glass of ale with no change in colour or demeanor._

 _Mike's sobriety is deceptive. At the end of an hour of silent drinking, he turns to her and mumbles, "Why aren't you dancing, Nanaba?"_

 _She doesn't look away from the lines and the couples swirling on the dance floor, very few of them in rhythm. "I don't dance," she says, not rudely, but not with any amount of friendliness._

" _I don't believe that," Mike says, leaning forward. "You use dance forms when you're using the gear. I've seen it." Nanaba looks at him, surprised. Even she hasn't realised that the dance poses drilled into her as a child could manifest in her fighting skills._

 _Somewhere, Miss Gregory will have deemed her job well done._

" _I was taught," she shrugs. "But I was never very good."_

" _I don't believe that."_

" _I don't want to dance, Mike," she says with finality in her tone. Mike understands immediately. "Sorry," he mumbles. "Don't want to force you. Didn't mean to -I mean…"_

 _He looks so flustered even Levi notices. "Cut him some slack. He's clearly drunk."_

 _She herself was going to console Mike, but the statement freezes her up. "I don't believe drunkenness can excuse anything. Anything." Her voice turns low, dangerous. Levi's eyes widen a little._

" _She's right," Mike says abruptly. "I'm sorry, Nanaba. Please forgive me for my conduct." He stands up and walks away, only a slight lilt to his step proof of his non-sober state._

 _Nanaba turns and glares at Levi. He raises an eyebrow. Then he sighs. "Fine. I was wrong. I'll leave." He stands up too, and walks to the bar. Nanaba notices that he orders a whiskey this time._

 _She is left alone, and somehow feeling bad for being right. But, unexpectedly, the chair next to her screeches, and Mike is sitting down next to her with two fresh glasses of ale._

" _I'm not here to goad you," he says, with a visible effort at calmness. "But I_ _am_ _drunk, and turns out I'm a talkative piece of shit when I'm drunk. So I would like to just talk with you, if you don't mind."_

 _She feels a smile quirk her lips. "I don't mind."_

" _If I'm obnoxious again, you can slap me."_

 _Her smile widens. "Gladly."_

 _Mike laughs, the first time she has heard him laugh. They talk inconsequentially for a while, and in the midst of a hilarious anecdote, Nanaba looks up and sees Levi watching them from the bar._

 _She crooks her finger at him. Curiosity seems to get the better of him, and he slips off his stool and approaches._

" _Don't be a creep," she tells him. "Come listen to Mike's story about the murderous goat."_

" _I've heard it before," he says, but joins them anyway._

 _Soon Levi, of all people, is sharing funny stories, his expression unwavering, which only makes Nanaba and Mike laugh harder. She is in the middle of an embarrassing snort-fest, when a voice booms next to her, "Nanabaaaaaa!"_

 _It is Gelgar._

" _What do you want, boat-head?"_

 _Gelgar leans over her but doesn't touch her. He knows from his training days that she was not to be touched unless she wanted to be. "Sing for us, won't you?"_

 _She turns red, while Mike turns to her. "You can sing?"_

 _She can't lie her way out. Gelgar is belting praises about her singing until she stops him. "Alright, enough, Gelgar, no-one's_ _that_ _perfect. I'll sing."_

 _She wants to start small, with a simple ballad that everyone can sing along with. But since everyone_ _does_ _sing along, her singing becomes a huge hit, and before she knows it, she keeps singing for the rest of the night, laughing at her comrades' antics. In the end, she even gets Levi to smile, and that is when she understands what it means to have a night out with friends._

* * *

"Friends. It is understandable that your bonds are strong, but…" Hange paused and continued resolutely, "I can see that you're too clever, too aware of the world to be optimistic enough to just follow friends."

Hange stood up and faced the window. "You understand, don't you, how cruel this world can be?"

Nanaba gazed out of the window too. "I do."

* * *

 _She is nineteen._

" _Nanaba, calm down," Gelgar murmurs as she marches down the corridors. "I am calm," she seethes, "Leave."_

 _Gelgar hesitates, but the look on her face seems to say enough. "Don't do something stupid," he warns her and walks away._

 _She knocks on the familiar door and bursts in before the voice could call out. Hange sits behind her usual desk, but does not look surprised._

" _Are you serious?" Nanaba thunders. She knows she lied to Gelgar. She is furious._

" _Nanaba-"_

" _You're giving me Stuart's squad? I didn't ask for a promotion."_

" _Nanaba-"_

" _I thought we agreed, Hange! No politics."_

" _You know Stuart is being sent away."_

" _I don't know anything!" She snaps. "There has been no official announcement. There have been rumours, but it's too monstrous to believe…"_

 _Hange is looking down at her papers. She almost looks ashamed. "What the hell is going on, Hange?"_

 _Hange doesn't look up. "Central is planning a Reclamation Expedition."_

" _A what?" She doesn't understand. She refuses to._

" _Reclamation Expedition," Hange repeats, her voice hollow. "They're enlisting civilians as well. They want to reclaim Wall Maria."_

 _Nanaba stares. "Reclaim how?"_

" _They say large numbers will help. They will go to Shiganshina and seal the holes that the Colossal and the Armoured-"_

" _Seal them? While the Titans applaud them or something?"_

" _It has been decreed, Nanaba," Hange sounds so tired her last syllable comes out as a sob. "Sixty percent of the Survey Corps has been enlisted. Thirty of the Garrison and ten-"_

" _Sixty_ _? What the hell are you saying?"_

 _Hange slams her palms on the table. "I'm saying we can't feed all the refugees. There just isn't enough. I'm saying hundreds of thousands of people are being sent out to their doom and the Survey Corps has to lead them!"_

 _Nanaba collapses onto a chair in shock. It can't be._ _It can't be._

" _And Stuart is going…"_

 _There is silence in the room. Neither of them talks, neither of them even looks at the other._

 _Both ashamed._

" _Why are we not going?" Nanaba whispers._

 _Hange sighs and takes off her glasses. "Erwin. He had to fight for us. You, me, Levi, Mike…"_

" _Who else?"_

" _Gelgar, Moblit, Ness-"_

" _I can't do it," she says abruptly. "You -you're giving me a dead man's squad."_

 _Hange smirks humourlessly. "That_ _is_ _how it works here."_

" _It's not the same." Nanaba shakes her head._

" _Why?"_

" _Because he's still alive."_

 _Hange sighs again. "You have to, Nanaba."_

" _Why me?" She cries. "Give it to someone else!"_

 _Hange's head snaps up. "Who else is there?" Nanaba is stunned by the emotion in her Squad Leader's voice. "Mike got promoted when Erwin got made Commander. Levi's getting his own squad. Gelgar is getting Metzger's squad. Lynne is getting-"_

" _You're sending Metzger?" Nanaba cuts in, incredulous. "He's a veteran! He's been with us for years, he's…"_

" _Old," Hange finishes for her. "So are most of the civilians."_

 _Nanaba is horrified. "Hange, this -this is… genocide."_

" _Yes," Hange rubs her eyes. "But tell me, what can we do?_ _What can we do?"_

" _We can go ourselves," Nanaba says softly._

 _Hange stands up so suddenly Nanaba jumps. "No. Absolutely not. You will not volunteer."_

" _If all of us elites sign up together…" But Hange's look is enough. Nanaba isn't stupid. She knows that in a plan this hopeless, no amount of elite soldiers could help. Sealing each hole would take months. All with Titans flowing in and swarming around. There is just no way this expedition will succeed._

" _How do we get past this?" Nanaba says finally._

" _We eat, because we can," Hange mutters. "And shore up our strength. And get out there and get rid of them all. All the Titans."_

 _And because this is Hange Zoë saying this, Nanaba knows she means it._

* * *

"The world _is_ cruel," Nanaba said gently. "But what can we expect? Nothing is perfect, after all. Why should the world be?"

"Perfection would be nice," Hange chuckled darkly.

"No," Nanaba said. "You don't mean that."

Hange looked at her. "No," she admitted. "I don't."

* * *

 _Nanaba gets the news when they are in Trost, awaiting the trial of the Titan kid. She still has her doubts about keeping such a dangerous asset within the Survey Corps, but, of course, it is not her place to say. The trial is important, but can be missed. She tells the messenger that she will follow him back in a couple hours. She talks to Erwin and packs for a night, then leaves._

 _They stop at an inn where she had earned her keep by being a scullery maid for a month. The people recognise her, and let her stay for free, refusing any sort of payment._

 _She reaches her childhood home in the morning. The receiving hall is filled with people, mostly lawyers and merchants and creditors. She walks past them without them noticing, and goes straight to the family rooms upstairs._

 _The upholstery has not been changed; it has faded even more over the years. All the guest rooms she walks past are covered in dust. She pauses at her old room, and watches the ghosts come to life._

 _There is still a stack of newspapers under the desk. There are her dusty schoolbooks on the shelf behind it. The silk sheets are from when she last made her bed. She walks in, right on the dark stain on the carpet, and opens her wardrobe. Old dresses, frayed and covered in dust, are still hanging there. She fingers the velvet one she wore when the boys beat her up._

 _She sighs, closes the door, and walks out. She is never coming back._

 _She walks past more empty, dusty rooms, before reaching the one at the end of the corridor. The door is open, and through it she can see a man stretched out under the faded bedcovers. A physician and two nurses hover around him, while a man sits on a couch in the other end of the room. She recognises him to be her father's steward._

 _She strides in and they all look up. "Excuse me, ma'am, this is a private room…"_

" _I'm family."_

 _The invalid stirs at her voice. "Look who's back," he murmurs, his voice an echo of his stronger days. She goes to stand next to the bed and looks down at him._

" _Miss me?" He whispers. He has lost several teeth and is almost bald._

" _You're pathetic," she tells him calmly._

 _He wheezes hard and she realises he's laughing. "Is this how a daughter greets her father?"_

" _In this case, yes."_

 _He looks at her properly. "You look like a frigging boy," he mutters._

 _She shrugs. "The hair was a liability."_

" _You could have earned well if you'd sold it to a wig-maker."_

" _I did."_

" _Did you, now? Glad to see some of my teachings stayed with you."_

 _She leans forward casually, flips out a knife from her boot and places it against his neck. "You taught me nothing._ _Nothing_ _. Everything I am today is what you never wanted me to learn." The physician and nurses protest at the knife, but she ignores them._

" _Kill me, then. I'm a dead man anyway."_

 _She raises her eyebrows. "And end your suffering? Why should I?" She steps back, withdrawing the knife._

" _Why are you here, then, traitorous little bitch?"_

 _One of the nurses gasps._

 _Nanaba shrugs. "To make you suffer more, of course." She turns to the steward. "How are you, Henrik?"_

 _The man stands up and bows to her. "Very well, Lady Nanaba. Though not so well as you look."_

" _I'm not a Lady anymore." Her father grunts from the bed, clearly trying to join the conversation, but she ignores him._

" _Ah, but you are, technically, my lady."_

" _True." She turns back to the monster in the bed. "But not for long."_

 _The Duke makes a small noise of protest. She ignores him again, and proceeds to systematically ruin the rest of his life._

 _First she talks to the physician, asks him for an accurate description of the state of her father's health, and an exact estimate of the money owed to him and the nurses. Then she talks to the steward, who has brought along a lawyer in the meantime. Bill after bill of debt is discussed. Then they talk about assets. Land, the house, silk, jewels._

 _She dismisses the two nurses. The physician can come once a day, for a week at the most. There won't be any need for him after that. He leaves for the day._

 _Then the lawyer draws up the document, as she dictates._

 _The day her father dies, the remaining family jewels will be sold, and the biggest, most urgent debts settled first. Then the rooms will all be systematically stripped, their furnishings sold, paying off the rest of the debts. Should there remain more, the sale of the house and the estate shall cover that and the servants' legacies. The funeral will be paid for from the money specifically received by the sale of the objects in her room. The remaining money will be donated to the Survey Corps._

" _What is this?" Her father shrieks at one point. She doesn't answer him, and the lawyer and the steward keep their eyes trained on the papers in front of them. He continues to yell at them spasmodically, but they pay him no heed._

 _She looks it over, and gives her nod of approval. The lawyer carefully rolls the document up and tucks it into his coat._

" _Henrik," her father rasps, rage making his face turn mad purple. "Explain!"_

 _Nanaba stalls him. "That was my last will and testament, orders to dispose of all my worldly belongings. The day you die, I will submit my family name to the Survey Corps, officially giving up my civilian rights and title. I am taking this document with me, which I will sign, also on the day you die. This is my official statement that I am renouncing my worldly titled possessions in order to lead a soldier's life. I will be the sole owner of the family's assets at that point, and I will dispose of them as I see fit. Your family is finished. There will no more be a Lady Nanaba Hol-"_

 _Her father never lets her finish. He bursts into a garbled tirade of slurs and insults, all in a voice so weak and raspy she hardly understands him. When he shows no sign of stopping, she simply talks over him, and dismisses the other two men._

 _His voice dies away when it's just the two of them left. "Murderer," he rasps. She doesn't respond, she looks at him for one long moment, commits his pathetic image to her memory, then turns around to leave._

" _Looks like I've groomed you well," he shouts as she walks to the door. "You're a chip off the old block, Nanaba. You will always be daddy's little girl."_

 _Then she makes her mistake: she turns around to look at him, and her last image of him is erased. Her father, the Duke, is leering at her, his yellow teeth glinting in a dark grin. He is laughing at her._

 _Tears spring into her eyes and she slams the door shut behind her furiously._

* * *

"But we digress," Hange said briskly and sat down again. "Tell me. Why did you join the Survey Corps?"

Nanaba looked at the floor again.

Why _did_ she join? Did she even know herself?

* * *

 _She is twenty-two years old._

 _Gelgar is falling. Gelgar is going to die. She can see his stupid gelled boat hairstyle glint in the moonlight. She cannot let him die._

 _With a yell, she calls for him and takes down the Titan that has got hold of him. As she lands on the curved wall, she sees him fall into a gap in the tower._

 _He's safe._

 _She presses the triggers, but nothing happens. She looks down. Dammit. She's out of gas._

 _Then she looks up._

 _Titans surround her, all fleshy and leering. The next few seconds are a blur. She tries to run. She tries to swing out of the way. But something grasps onto her wire and pulls her down._

 _Long hair is a liability, she thinks suddenly. But her hair isn't long…_

 _When the pain erupts in her right knee, she looks down and screams when she sees a glass shard embedded there. A corner of it is still dripping amber liquid._

 _Then she hears laughter over her screaming. The Duke is back. The Duke is leering at her with his yellow teeth. He is pressing, pulling on her limbs until they ache. He is cutting her up with more shards of the liquor bottle. The stench of his blood (_ _her blood_ _) is filling her nostrils. His whip is searing everywhere on her body now. His cold grasp is everywhere._

" _Daddy's little girl," his voice rumbles around her._

" _Father, please!" She begs._

 _Then he eats her._

* * *

"I -I think…" Her voice petered away, and she tried again. "I was raised to be a perfect woman. It was my father's biggest dream." Hange simply listened. "When I ran away from home, I promised myself I would try to be perfect on my own terms. And to me, being a soldier of humanity's hope, carrying out that duty, is the best way to attain perfection, as near to it as possible, anyway." She paused. "I want to be perfect in every way I was groomed not to be. I can do that in the Survey Corps."

There was silence. Nanaba wondered if she divulged too much, wondered what the Squad Leader would think. She wondered if the rumours would spread about her father.

But Hange simply leaned forward with a warm smile. "Welcome to the Survey Corps, Nanaba. It's a pleasure to meet you."

And for the first time that day, Nanaba smiled, too.

* * *

 **Hokay, where do I even begin? I have been wanting to write Nanaba's story ever since that horrible episode in Season 2. And so I tried, and this chapter is the best I can do at this point, I think. I hope I did justice to her beautiful character.**

 **Some notes/thoughts:**

 **1) Nanaba's internal monologue in the beginning states that Hange is in the top three of the SC. These would be Mike, Erwin and Hange, in that order. Levi, as per my timeline, has just been recruited, and the main conversation in this story happens in the same year Levi is recruited, but after the incidents of Kuinaki Sentaku (ACWNR), so his true worth to humanity is not quite known yet.**

 **2) As for my timeline, I have been plagued by the idea that Nanaba is much older in her final episode. However, to be able to relate her story to the main storyline of SnK, and in interest of all the info available, I have made Nanaba as young as she is.**

 **3) Also, the Reclamation Expedition. The images we are shown regarding this have a lot of the Survey Corps insignia. However, we also see Military police helping the people enlist. I like to think Erwin personally convinced Central to deploy these numbers. I'm convinced the original plan was to only send out the Survey Corps with the civilians.**

 **4** **) References galore from Kuinaki Sentaku, also from the Before the Fall manga! Don't worry, not knowing the references does not change your experience of the story at all.**

 **5** **) The Duke is dying in the end of cancer. I don't even know or care which type, take your pick. Maybe even all of them, that disgusting piece of shit.**

 **6)** **Nanaba is described everywhere as a calm, patient woman. Her only break in character was towards the end, when she was dying. This was my biggest gap to bridge, and pretty much the entire chapter was written in an effort to reconcile dark Nanaba with the Nanaba we all know and love. Hope it worked!**

 **7** **) Also, my newest ship is Mikenana because omg how cute are they! I may write some other stuff with these two, but for now I have only this horrible piece of tragedy and angst. Sorry about that.**

 **Lastly, but most importantly : That one horrific scene from when her father sexually assaults her was one of the hardest things I had to write. Not only because the act described was so horrible, also because I had to make sure that I did it right. In all my years of writing fanfiction, I have never written smut, and contend myself with writing consensual, soft-core romance (save implications of rape in another fic, but even that never went this far).**

 **With experience like that, I doubted being able to write the difficult scene that I had imagined, but I had to try it anyway. Basically, I want to assure you that I want to in no way romanticize or humanize that disturbing act. If it comes across as such in any way, please let me know, and I will change or remove that section entirely. This is an issue that I have not taken lightly, and I would never intentionally offend or belittle the horrible experiences of millions of victims across the world. **

**Let me say it again - Please, if you feel this is distasteful, or offensive in any way, let me know, and I will take the scene down.**

 **Well, that's all I can think of, I guess. Thanks for the support and the reviews, they really keep me going!**


	8. Heavyweight

**Yooo. So after my last chapter, which was basically a really long angst-fest, I decided to do something light-hearted for this one.**

 **Though I would have preferred to make it more humourous, this fic panned out the way it did as I wrote it, so I can't really think of what to change where.**

 **Anywho** **, this story's also an exception -it deals with a character's motivation, but not for the Survey Corps this time.** **Enjoy the read!**

 ** _Heavyweight_**

Mikasa Ackerman was an extraordinarily patient girl. This fact was universally acknowledged, along with the fact of her near-inhuman strength, that of her unparalleled skill in picking up skills, and of her doll-like beauty. Some of her comrades, when not in her presence, also called her 'Madam Patience', other than 'The Beast', 'Black-haired Goddess' and 'Momkasa'. She did not know of any of these names, you understand, because the utterer would not be alive to speak it again.

On this sunny afternoon, the names were repeated yet again after Mikasa left the mess hall with something close to anger. "Madam Patience's finally had it, I see," Ymir smirked, picking up a loaf of bread with a flourish.

"I thought she looked as stoic as ever," Krista murmured, automatically slapping Ymir's hand and causing her to drop the bread.

"Aw, come on, Krista, can't you share with _me_? Your special friend?"

Krista looked unmoved. "My plate, my food."

"You gave bread to Potato Girl on our first day!"

"Why don't you run till you drop, then?"

"If physical activity is what you want me to do, then there are so many others that I'd rather do."

Connie grimaced and turned away. "Ugh. Ymir is being gross again."

The other people at his table agreed wholeheartedly. "Shouldn't someone check on her?" Jean muttered, eyeing the door.

Armin shook his head emphatically. "Yeah, no. Not a good idea."

"Why not?"

"She'll beat you up."

Jean scoffed. "I can handle myself."

This, predictably, produced raucous laughter at the table. "Against Mikasa, really, Jean?"

Jean looked affronted for a moment, then his face slackened. "Yeah, okay. Point taken. I've come this far in training, I don't want to die when I have like, two days left."

"Clever man."

Sasha swallowed her food with a loud gulp and slammed her palms onto the table. "So. What do you guys want to do now?"

It was their last day in training camp. The following day, they were to set off to Trost, where their results would be announced and the 104th Training Corps would be formally disbanded. The higher-ups had been surprisingly lenient and let their last day at camp be a free day.

The others shrugged. Connie turned to Armin, his arms stretched up to support his head. "You want to see Eren get thrashed by Reiner?"

Armin shook his head. "Seen enough of that. Besides, he's not that bad, you know," he added, ever the loyal friend. "He's beat Reiner just as much."

"Yeah, but like, didn't you see him run off just now? _Krista_ could pulverise him now."

Armin sighed. "He does get foolishly incompetent when he's excited."

The conversation derailed soon after that because Ymir had heard Connie's quip about _her_ Krista and they had to settle to watch Connie get pulverised instead.

Mikasa, meanwhile, had changed into her workout clothes at the barracks and was on her way to the gym. She was in a murderous mood, and wanted to vent it out, as she often did, by clobbering imaginary people.

It was either that or actually clobber her source of frustration, but she cared too much about Eren to cripple him, even a little bit.

Eren, she thought to herself moodily, was a jerk. She would never voice this thought out loud, and would gladly disembowel anyone else who made such a claim, but the fact remained: he was a loud, inconsiderate, childish _jerk_. Sure, she could maybe get a bit too clingy sometimes. Or too possessive. Or too condescending. All of the things Eren insisted she was. But really, _must_ he be so rude?

She strode into the gym, slapped her towel down next to her on the bench press, and began to lift. She glared at the barbell as she lifted, letting out a bit of her frustration every time she exhaled. No one could doubt her sour mood.

Which is why, probably as a last resort, someone dropped something with a loud crash.

Mikasa nearly let the barbell fall down on her, but saved herself at the last moment. She sat up and whipped around. She hadn't expected anyone to be at the gym today, it being last day and all that.

When she saw who it was, though, she couldn't be surprised. Annie Leonhardt was wiping her face with her towel, when she noticed Mikasa glance her way. "Hi," she said in her usual monotone. She seemed to have practically thrown her dumbbells down, an effort to clue Mikasa in on the fact that she was not alone, no doubt.

Mikasa simply nodded and turned away. She had often trained at the same time as Annie, although she would have preferred it if she were alone just then.

"You want me to leave?"

Mikasa turned around again, surprised. In their three years of training together, this was the first time Annie had spoken to her in the gym. "What?"

"You look like a massacre waiting to happen. I'd rather not stick around when it does."

Mikasa never scowled, but something like it appeared on her face. "You can leave if you want. Don't make me your excuse."

Annie raised her eyebrow. "You're kind of proving my point."

Mikasa narrowed her eyes. Did Annie _want_ a confrontation? "What's the problem, Annie? Are you _scared_?"

Annie's expression fell flat. She looked intensely dangerous. "This is what I get for actually trying to be considerate."

"You need more practice. It came out annoying."

Annie's hands were in fists now. Mikasa hated and respected Annie enough to prefer her over an imaginary adversary. _Come on, fight me!_ She felt rashly exuberant; it seemed Eren was finally rubbing off on her.

Then the gym door creaked open in all its loud, whining glory, and a man strode in. Both the girls faced the newcomer in defensive poses.

"M -Mikasa? Annie?"

It wasn't the person she had least expected -she had forgotten the person even _existed_ to begin with. A quick glance at Annie told her it was the same case for her.

" _Daz_?"

Annie was more articulate. "What the hell are you doing here?"

He immediately broke into a sweat. Sure, he wasn't the brightest of them all, but he knew perfectly well he seemed to have walked into a warzone. "Um, I wanted to train." The two girls looked blankly at him.

He gulped audibly. "I'll leave."

"No." Mikasa's voice pierced the air like a gunshot. " _I_ don't have a problem. You can train here." She could feel Annie glare daggers at her. "Neither do I."

Daz continued to vindicate his instincts. "N -no, I think I'll leave."

Unfortunately, it was too late for him. Mikasa's and Annie's eyes narrowed with perfect synchronization.

"Why?" Mikasa intoned.

"You don't want to train with us?"

Daz let out an audible whimper. "H-ha, no! Of course not! I… I'd be _honoured_ -"

"Get at it, then," Annie drawled, nodding at the impressive collection of weights and dumbbells.

"Oh, erm, okay." He approached the weights looking ready to burst into tears.

Mikasa noticed and made a great show of being _considerate_. "Unless you don't want to train with the weights, Daz. What were you planning on doing originally?"

"I -I wanted to stretch a little first…"

"Good. Get at it, then." Mikasa gestured at the empty half of the gym, set aside for sparring, catfights and gossip sessions. Her voice was deliberately low and mild, and when she turned around, she saw Annie rolling her eyes.

Both girls picked up their respective weights and continued to pump them. Daz stared at them, open-mouthed, until Mikasa shot him a glance with her steel-grey eyes. He burst into nervous activity after that.

For a minute, there was silence except for the rhythmic, heavy breaths of the girls and an occasional loud shudder from Daz. Then Annie dropped her dumbbells again, making Mikasa flinch.

"You're doing it wrong."

Mikasa was rearing to use her manic glare on Annie, but stopped herself, frowning, when Annie walked over to Daz.

"You twist your arms like that, you'll end up spraining them." Annie spoke tonelessly, but she was clearly repeating something someone else had told her. "The idea is to loosen your muscles, not tear them."

Daz looked so alarmed at Annie approaching him that he took several steps back.

Annie sighed. "Do you want my help or not?"

Daz looked positively giddy. " _You_ want to help _me_? T -thanks, Annie!"

Mikasa clenched her teeth. _That little weasel_. She made to lift her barbell, and realised that she had lost count. Shooting a glare at the other two (Daz twitched horribly, but Annie looked unconcerned), she restarted her set.

She tuned them out for a while after that as she continued lifting. When she was done with all her sets, she wiped herself down, and looked around. Annie was now using the leg press. And Daz… Daz was trying to break his own neck.

"What do you think you're doing?" Mikasa called out to him, her voice sharper than she intended. Daz, who was attempting to do some crunches on the floor, fell back with a little shriek.

"M-Mikasa, I'm sorry-!"

"Don't apologize," she said and walked over to him. "Crunches are supposed to work on your core. Your abdomen," she amended when she saw Daz panic. "You're only moving your neck, and you'll end up cricking it or something. You have to lift your shoulders and as much of your back as you can." She frowned. "Haven't you done any of this before?"

He looked down, nervous. "I kind of… avoided the gym."

 _That sounded about right_. Mikasa sighed. "Well, move over. I'm getting started on my abs."

There was a clunk as Annie set down the weights, letting her legs go slack. She was regarding them expressionlessly, but Mikasa knew she was curious. Very well. She'd show her.

The next quarter hour passed in a blur, with Mikasa spending more time talking to Daz than she had in the three years they been comrades. But Annie, it seemed, was not willing to give up just yet.

After Mikasa was done with her crunches, and Daz was allowed to stop because he had started to cry, Annie took over. She in turn tutored him in leg exercises, both standing and on the floor, finishing up with several demonstrations of powerful kicks -with Daz, the unfortunate soul, being at the toe end of most of them.

Then Mikasa guided him through push-ups; Annie made him do pull-ups. Mikasa taught him breathing exercises, and Annie lectured him on the art of pacing oneself and heart rates and the importance of being hydrated.

It was impossible at this point to say what Daz was doing more -sweating, or crying. Neither of the girls seemed to care either way.

Mikasa, who had been silently fuming through Annie's talk because it had been so long-winded and interesting, took over again. "Time to start on the weights, Daz," she said flatly.

By now, Daz had given up on trying to stop; the girls were both astonishingly deaf when he suggested stopping. He approached the bench press warily, wiping away the amalgamation of tears, sweat and snot on his face.

"You know what you have to do with this, right?" Mikasa told him. "You saw me."

Daz nodded. "So I lift it? Like this?"

Before Mikasa could stop, or even snap at him, because _what a stupid thing to do_ , he reached down and picked up the barbell that she had piled with weights.

With one hand.

And remained standing.

There was a dull clatter -Annie had dropped her nunchucks in shock. Mikasa staggered.

Daz looked confused, then put down the barbell like he was setting down a particularly heavy book. "W-what's wrong?"

She exchanged glances with Annie, surely she had imagined it? Nope, Annie looked just as gobsmacked as her. She turned back to Daz and floundered, speechless.

"That's… really heavy," Annie managed to say from her corner.

Daz looked at the barbell. "Oh. Well, y-yeah, it felt heavy to me."

Mikasa felt Annie come stand next to her but she suddenly didn't care. "How strong _are_ you, Daz?"

Daz, who was paler than Mikasa, flushed red at her question. "I'm not strong, not really, not like the two of you!" Both girls remained stoic. "I've just… been able to lift really heavy things, all my life. It's not like it's useful or anything, like I still can't aim my punches, and I still fall sick easily -you saw, right, in the winter training. So, um, yeah. It's why I joined the Training Corps… seemed a waste to spend my life lifting, I don't know, rocks or something. Better to do something useful with my skill, right."

Several moments of silence followed, and Daz grew visibly nervous again. Then Annie spoke. "I'm done." She turned to Mikasa. "You?"

"Me too," she agreed, and collected her towel.

Daz stared after them. "B-but… what about the weights?"

"Yeah, the weights are really nice. Shiny. Bye, Daz." Annie, who was holding the door open for Mikasa, slammed it shut behind them.

There were some clouds in the sky now, which was nice. They walked to the barracks in silence, but Mikasa felt oddly content.

"So what was with the bad mood?"

Mikasa looked at Annie thoughtfully. Her icy blue eyes were as serene as ever.

Mikasa made her decision and sighed. "Boys."

Annie blinked. Then she sighed, too. "Boys," she agreed.

 **Okay, I simply _adore_ Mikasa/Annie interactions. Because they're like rivals, but not really, and secretly enemies anyway, but comrades together? They're also the two most badass people in their squad and I'm convinced that if not for Reiner's team-player-scouts-honour persona and Annie's apathy, she would have easily ranked second next to Mikasa. Because, say what you will, Mikasa is still an Ackerman, you know.**

 **I** **have mostly gone on what I personally know of working out in a gym. I have no doubt Annie and Mikasa's training sessions are way more intense than I've described here. Also, we've never really seen any gym with equipment as such, only Mikasa training by herself , but I figure there _must_ be such a place anyway. Basically, just go with it, guys!**

 **The** **humour I intended for this chapter turned out to be rather muted. Not sure what it does for the flow of the chapter, let me know how it comes across to you!**

 **Also** **, the internet is a marvel, because I used the phrase "beat up" like ten times before I realised I needed help, heh.**

 **Last** **, but definitely not the least, thanks Midnight's Fire for your review! And thanks to everyone else for the support! Keep reviewing! :)**


	9. Deal Breaker

**Okay, I tried, guys. I tried to stay away. This chapter was ready days ago, but I thought I'd wait until the next issue came out so I could write a better flashback scene. But I just. Couldn't. Keep away.**

 **Anyhow** **, this chapter was, again, fun to write. More explanations in the end! Almost zero spoilers, I guess, except for a character's name (I say zero spoilers if you've watched both seasons of the anime).** **Enjoy the read!**

 **Deal Breaker**

It was a fairly sunny day, the sky was a cheerful blue. Birds twittered somewhere, but try as she might, she could not see any.

All this clashed horribly with the sight in front of her. Sunlight gleamed on rubble, particles of ash still pervaded the air. Here and there were patches of rusty brown in varying shapes and sizes. She knew most of the blood was not from civilians.

She should have heard the screeches of vultures, the cawing of crows. Birdsong was _wrong_. Everything was wrong, lately.

She had to tear her gaze away from the battlefield. The wall towered behind her, and using her gear, she reached the top easily.

The land beyond Wall Rose was quite beautiful. She could still see remnants of fields and farmland beyond the ruins of the buildings near the gate. It must have been a very pretty district, she thought.

The familiar whine of the gear sounded behind her, and someone landed on the wall, and approached her. The footsteps were heavy, but hesitant. She knew those footsteps very well.

"Annie," he said.

She didn't turn around. "Bertholdt."

He stood next to her, wavering.

"What is it?"

"N-nothing. I just wanted to talk." He sounded flustered.

She still didn't look at him. "Oh? Where's Reiner?"

"With the others. Preparing for the… funeral."

Annie snorted, though nothing was remotely funny. "Asshole."

"Annie," Bertholdt sighed. "He's coping."

"So we should do the same? _Forget_?"

"Of course not! He's… coping in his own way."

"I'm allowed to hate his methods, yes?" She finally looked at him.

He looked terrible. Bags hung under his eyes, and his entire posture seemed weakened, as though he had transformed that morning, rather than a week ago. "You don't need permission for that," he said softly.

"Then he's an asshole." She turned away, to her right, where they could see dozens of engineers in the process of affixing metal bars on the rock that had sealed the gate. Bertholdt followed her gaze.

"Will that make it difficult for you?" She asked. "To knock down again?"

He shrugged slightly. "Probably. It doesn't matter, though."

"No?"

"No." He adjusted his collar. "There's no need now, what with…"

"Eren," she said softly.

It had to be him. Of course it had to be Eren Jaegar.

"Why did it have to be him." Bertholdt was was evidently thinking along the same lines.

"Who would you rather it was? Armin?" She directed him a cold glare and he flinched.

"No. None of them, really," he said slowly.

She had nothing to say to that. "But it's him for sure, then?"

He ran a hand through his hair. "We don't know yet. We need access to the Military Police records. But Reiner snooped on them during the Cleaning Operation, and something definitely happened to the Reiss family five years ago."

"It explains a lot," Annie agreed. "The inactivity of the King, for one thing."

"The genocide," he said quietly.

The horror. She deliberately moved away from that thought.

"So Eren has the Coordinate."

"Looks like it. I mean, you felt it, didn't you?" He muttered. "The… the weird…"

"Stirring, yes."

When they had first seen Eren's Titan form rampaging in Trost, Annie had felt a slight tremor, a weird pull in her gut toward the Titan. It was very, very mild, to be sure. But it was there. There was _something_ about Eren Jaegar that drew the Titan Shifters to him.

Was that why they had all interacted with him so much during training? They had been careful when making friends (except for Reiner, of course, that two-faced shit), but Annie knew she had been intrigued by the boy who insisted on getting beat up by her until he had learnt to defend himself. What had she done? What had they given to the enemy?

Why was _he_ the enemy?

Eren being the enemy boded worse for them because of his _friends_ : Armin, whose intellect frightened her, and Mikasa, whose strength terrified her. Either of them could have the Coordinate and it would be the same. Cross one of them and you have all three to deal with.

What a fucking mess.

"So, you're still joining the Military Police, then." Bertholdt was staring at his feet.

"I don't see why not."

"No, you're right, we need access to their information and their resources."

Annie regarded him for a long moment. "You're not coming with me."

Sweat beaded on his forehead and his cheeks flushed. "I don't know yet." He looked at her. "I know that was the original plan, but…"

"Did Reiner ask you to join the Survey Corps with him?"

He shook his head. "I -I'm worried about him." He looked away again. "After Marco…"

She scoffed. "Yeah, you're right. You have to watch over him. He might jeopardise the whole operation."

"Y-yeah." Then, because it got too quiet for too long, "Annie, are you mad at me?"

"Why would I be mad?"

Bertholdt toyed with his collar. "Because… we had a deal."

Her eyes widened slightly; she was surprised he still remembered.

 _They had been running for a while. The Armoured Titan had got them past Shiganshina, but after that they had to do it the hard way. The human way. By the time they reached Wall Rose they were exhausted._

 _"We'll be heading off here," Reiner had said. He had changed lately, he was more commanding, more assertive. She was reminded of Marcel and it sickened her._

 _"Annie, you can come with us," Bertholdt had said. "We were supposed to be in two teams, you weren't supposed to be alone, Marcel-"_

 _"I can handle myself!" She'd spat at him._

 _"All three of us together isn't a good idea, Bertholdt," Reiner had said, in his new leader voice. "We shouldn't appear to be obvious allies."_

 _"But-"_

 _"I said, I can handle myself!"_

 _But_ _some of her worry must have shown on her face. Bertholdt hesitated, then took her hand in his. She had been too shocked to protest. "I'll come with you to the Inner Walls, Annie. When we finish training, we'll get to the King, together. Deal?"_

 _She_ _hadn't been expecting it. Reiner had frowned. "That's not the plan, Bertholdt-"_

 _"Two people need to be in the Inner Walls, close to the King! That's the plan, isn't it?"_

 _Reiner_ _had sighed. "Yes."_

 _Bertholdt_ _had turned back to her, his cautious smile on his face. "Deal, Annie?"_

 _"Y-yeah."_

He still remembered.

"We were children. We were stupid." Annie's voice was flat. "The plan is important, and the plan changes as developments progress. Remember that?"

He looked almost ashamed. "I remember."

"Good. Because the latest development is that the Coordinate is in the Survey Corps. We'll have to adjust accordingly."

"R-right."

"Of course, it doesn't help that one of us is a fucking liability because he's a shit-faced asshole."

"Annie-"

"Save it. Reiner's the deal breaker here. I get it."

He was gazing at her with a strange expression. "Annie, I wish… I wish I could join the Military Police with you. I -I really-"

She grasped his arm in a vise-like grip and placed a finger on her lips. He looked confused for a split second, and then he heard it too.

Gas escaping the gear and wires snicking in. They both turned around to see someone small and blond stumble over the edge.

"Armin," Bertholdt almost sounded fearful. Annie's heart was pounding. She hoped he didn't hear them, please, _please, not him, too…_

"Hey guys," Armin gasped, and relief almost made her smile. He hadn't heard, or he wouldn't have been so calm. Besides, now that she thought about it, Armin would never have come to confront them if he had eavesdropped. He was clever enough to make sure other people found out immediately, unlike Marco. She could easily imagine it: Armin, with his scary blue eyes, siccing an enraged Mikasa on her.

That last thought made her turn cold again, and she released Bertholdt and crossed her arms.

"Bertholdt was telling me he's joining the Survey Corps," she spoke first, using half-truths to hide the big, fat lie her life was. As usual.

She knew Bertholdt would be caught off-guard by her announcement, but so would Armin, and that was what mattered.

"Bertholdt! Why?" Armin cried, and she nearly winced at the concern in his voice. Why did he care so much? Why did _she_ care that he cared?

Bertholdt, for all his nervous demeanour, was an accomplished liar. They all had to be, of course.

"Yeah, I mean, after what happened… I couldn't just sit obliviously in the Inner Walls. It just doesn't seem right, you know." Annie watched from the corner of her eye, fascinated. He really was good at this.

Armin nodded sombrely. Annie noticed he looked subdued. He also looked paler, weaker, and had dark circles under his eyes. She could guess at the reason, though.

"So Eren's gone, huh?" Annie asked him.

Armin nodded again. He looked so much like a sad, lost little kid that her gut twisted. _What the hell kind of bond_ , she thought, _is between those three?_

She glanced at Bertholdt. Did they, the Titan shifters, have the same bond?

Then she thought of Marcel. _Hell, no_.

"He left to the Survey Corps headquarters today."

"How's Mikasa?" Bertholdt sounded sympathetic.

"Coping," Armin said cautiously. Annie felt a laugh coming on. _More like moping, probably,_ she thought with a certain amount of viciousness.

Armin glanced at her, and for a disconcerting moment, she felt as though he knew exactly what she was thinking. This, _this_ was why Armin scared her. Those big blue eyes were inescapable.

"Well, we'll see him soon, I hope," Armin said, his voice normal, at any rate. "After the Choosing Ceremony tomorrow, we'll be there too." He sighed and looked away. "We haven't seen him since we pulled him out of the Titan six days ago." Annie and Bertholdt turned to the rock, too. It was like Eren's triumphant roar from that day was still echoing to them, across time. She had never heard anything like it. She would never forget it.

Bertholdt, for all his acting skills, still looked uneasy. Annie wondered what he had been about to tell her before Armin had interrupted them. If she were being honest with herself, she had an inkling. The problem was, she didn't know if she really wanted to hear it, or not.

Bertholdt made a show of stretching. "I'm heading back. Want to take a shower before the, er, funeral." He turned to the two of them. "I'm staying," Annie murmured. "Me too," Armin chimed in. "That is, if Annie doesn't mind?"

She shrugged and flopped down on the outer edge of the wall, ignoring the nervous flutter in her stomach.

Bertholdt left after shooting her a lingering gaze, which she pointedly ignored. Armin sat down next to her. They were both quiet for a while, something Annie appreciated. She wondered for perhaps the thousandth time how a guy like Armin was friends with a guy like Eren. Had Eren been there, he would have made sure everyone was aware of his presence. It was very difficult to ignore Eren.

Again, Armin seemed to be disturbingly in tune with her thoughts.

"Eren and I had fought once, really badly." Armin said casually, as though he often had conversations like this with her. "We were pretending to travel to a far-off place. I wanted to go to Trost, because it was supposed to be a very fascinating district. Lots of history, and nice scenery. Eren insisted on going outside the walls. I said there wouldn't be any inns in the outside world, where were we going to sleep at night? Eren said that didn't matter. I said, of course it mattered, sleep is important! And so we stopped talking to each other." He smiled, his gaze fixed on the horizon beyond which lay his old home, lost to him forever. "We were so young, we held the grudge for _days_."

"Children," Annie said carefully, "are stupid."

Armin laughed. "I agree. When we finally spoke to each other again, we'd forgotten what the fight was about!"

Annie looked at him. "That can't be true. Because you're telling me the story now, and you clearly still remember."

Armin cast her a sharp glance, and she had to turn away. He was doing it again -scrutinizing her, and it scared her. "You're very perceptive, Annie," he said, and when she risked looking at him, he was smiling, to her surprise. "No-one has ever pointed that out, you know." He turned away again. "So yes, _I_ still remember. Eren forgot. But by the third morning, I was tired of being angry. My grudge only made me more miserable because Eren was my only friend. It was a stupid thing to fight over, anyway, and so I made up with him."

"Are you that forgiving, then?"

He shrugged. "I guess I am."

She drew up her knees and hugged them, mimicking his pose. "So what would be a deal breaker for you? Would you forgive anything?"

Armin smiled grimly. "I'm not that nice a person, Annie."

"No one is."

"True."

"You still haven't answered my question."

He blinked. She saw him clench his jaw. "I still haven't forgiven the Government -the King -for the Reclamation Expedition. It's not something I'll ever forgive."

"So, genocide. Genocide is your deal breaker."

"I… guess?"

"You don't know?"

He shook his head. "I don't know what someone could do that would make me go, 'No, I'm _never_ forgiving this person'. It hasn't happened yet." He looked genuinely curious.

She wondered if she would be it. Armin's deal breaker. That thought terrified her more than any other.

"I hope I never find out," he said softly.

Annie turned back to the horizon, where his long-lost home lay in ruins.

 _Me too._

 **Sooo, I have to say, I love Annie's PoV. Yes she swears a lot because that's how I imagine the inside of her head to be. If they weren't on opposite sides of the battle, I think she and Levi would have gotten along marvellously, aggravating Mikasa to no end.**

 **Also, yes, she hates Reiner. I don't think she always had, and I don't know if she keeps hating him. But at this point in the story, so soon after Marco, I'm sure she would have been furious at Reiner. He made her his accomplice and then conveniently forgot about it(repressed it, rather), and then there's this scene when they're gathering the bodies, and Annie is apologising but Reiner tells her that there's no point -like, stfu, Reiner. She would have been pretty resentful of him at this point, I guess.**

 **Third, pairings! I've purposely kept the entire chapter ambiguous. For those of you who prefer ErenXAnnie, there a few phrases that could support it. There's admittedly a lot more going for ArminXAnnie, but that's because I love their interactions, platonic or not, so it's up to you which one it is! Sorry for not pandering to the BertXAnnie shippers, I've only kept it one-sided for a reason. In my opinion, Annie would at this point want as little to do with the other two as possible. I guess she sees them as colleagues and refuses to acknowledge Bertholdt's feelings (yes, he was going to tell her how he felt before Armin barged in) because she's sick and tired of her mission. That's my headcanon anyway.**

 **Lastly, the flashback scene! I'm pretty sure manga #96 will have more deets on what exactly the shifters were up to during the fall of Shiganshina. I wanted to wait, but yeah, like I said, I'm on a roll here, and I ain't stoppin now. If the manga contains enough new info to warrant a rewrite of the flashback scene, I'll gladly do it.**

 **Thanks for reading, hope you guys like it! Please leave a review of you do!**


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